


The Case of Jonathan Carlyle

by nturtanyr



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-16 08:54:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 57,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29822451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nturtanyr/pseuds/nturtanyr
Summary: A mute coffee shop owner, an internet advertising company, fast-growing ivy, the British TV gameshow Mastermind, a zoological laboratory, automatons, and a VHS tape. Everything is connected and it all starts with the case of Jon Carlyle, who was attacked in his bookshop in a small Scottish town, and Dirk’s Detective Agency is hired to find out who.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 3





	1. Something Wicked

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys, just a quick note here - this isn't a season 3, this more a season 2.5. The story here only involves Dirk, Todd and Farah as they travel to the UK for a kind of 'one-off' case, which doesn't include all elements from the TV show that they received at the end of season 2. This is because it's kind of a test for this kind of fiction. It's written in the same style as the novel by Douglas Adams. The main focus is on the mystery element so if you enjoy it, and it does scratch that curiosity itch, let me know.

As if the heavens had opened and God had a hosepipe pointed at Livingston, the rain was enough to make Jon pull his coat as close as physically possible to his body. Unfortunately, the rain was clever enough to infiltrate; it slipped down his back and soaked his shirt. Jon tried nonetheless to prevent further intrusion and ran through the rain, finding shelter in every nook and cranny he could find in the street. He particularly avoided lampposts or cameras – he had memorised the route like the back of his hand.

After some time, hiding becomes a second nature. Jon had been doing it for long enough he just knew the way to avoid being seen; keeping answers concise, going at only certain times in the day and week, but switching which day it was so nobody could predict the pattern. Especially keeping the pattern random, but not too random, because some people’s random is actually quite predictable. For say, if someone said ‘pick a number between one and ten’, sure a common answer will be ‘seven’, but you can be assured if you ask them a second time they won’t pick the same number twice. Or three times even. So already they’ve made a tactical blunder.

Jon knew this, so sometimes he went out twice in one week, once he was out every Tuesday for four weeks, and once he didn’t go out on Mondays for seventeen weeks. But he had to get groceries at some point. At this point it consisted of sausages, lasagne sheets and several cans of spam.

He also kept his grocery list random. It made cooking quite the extraordinary ordeal.

The patter of rain on his plastic bag merged with the patter in the puddles, and occasionally was interrupted by a vehicle projecting a wave into the orchestral arrangement. It was late enough where Jon wasn’t going to run into any people. Jon hadn’t spoken to people properly for a long time, he wouldn’t know what to say. The sudden thought that he couldn’t make small talk ran through his head.

How do people do it, ‘hello, how are you?’. ‘Nice weather isn’t it?’ No, he couldn’t say that, it wasn’t nice weather at all. Or maybe he could play it off as being sarcastic. Would they laugh? What then? He reasoned he should read a self-help book on small talk when he got back home.

After several manoeuvres to lose a tail, one of which included climbing over a wall to drop to a lower street, and then climb back up, he reached a small road that could easily be mistaken for an alley. Down the alley, with closed curtains and empty book shelves sitting outside, was ‘Small Cranny’, the bookshop that Jon lived in. A small sign hung before the curtains with the word ‘Closed’ on it. Below it was a small piece of paper taped up that had his opening times typed up. Yet another attempt at irregularity, he made sure to change it every week. He unlocked the door using four keys, all the while trying to think up how you could breach the subject of how old someone was without causing offense.

Getting inside, he locked all four locks and also secured a chain lock for extra strength. He then double-checked every room to make sure no one he hadn’t expected had come in. There were strings looped over doorframes, flour dispelled at several spots, and a couple of intriguing books he’d left in awkward positions to catch out the curious burglar or obsessive-compulsive robber.

After determining he was safe and alone, he retreated to his kitchen to resolve to make something. Lasagne with sausage and spam? Maybe he had some gravy or ketchup that’d help wet the dry ingredients.

Fifteen minutes in to a failed dinner he managed some toast out of bread, and munched on it whilst listening to his radio. It was quiet enough that nobody would hear it from outside. He liked the sarcasm of David Mitchell – that was a man who couldn’t hold small talk and yet he was a celebrity. Jon nodded his head thinking he should take lessons from him at some point, and then remembered he did want to read about small talk. Leaving his toast, he went to the shop’s front and looked for the self-help books. Instead of small-talk he found a book on power stances and found himself entrenched about a quarter of the way when he heard a knock at the door.

He froze, his hairs stood on end. He managed a gulp but didn’t make another move, hoping it was a mistake. Instead the knock grew more insistent – four knocks. Four solid knocks. Jon didn’t even close his book he just waited, standing perfectly still. Two sets of knocks and someone normal would give up.

On the third set of knocks, he knew it was urgent. And the intensity had risen a couple more levels, rattling the door. Jon knew this was no visitor hoping for shelter from the rain, this was what he’d been expecting all this time. He finally closed his book, put it back on the shelf, slowly and quietly. Then he made his way out of sight from the front door, just behind a bookshelf of which he could still have a visual. He pressed his back flat against the wood, in front of him a doorway that would lead him back to the kitchen where the stairs were if he needed to get upstairs. He probably would need to get upstairs.

The moment finally reached its climax – the door rattled as the intruder attempted the door handle. It shook as they grew more urgent. Then several large slams determined they were attempting to beat down the door. Jon knew it would hold. But he also knew the window would not. He couldn’t leave out the back, there was no back in this building. The closest he had was a window in the bedroom but before he could put any plan into action the window in the front room smashed and the intruder found their way into his bookshop.

Jon cautiously edged his head round to see who it was. Millimetre by millimetre, the front room came into view of his right eye. When finally he could see the intruder come into frame they were standing in the room taking in their surroundings, inspecting the string that Jon had tied in the doorframe. He couldn’t identify them, they were cloaked and hooded. Their hands were wearing leather gloves. This person was very good at covering every inch of their body with clothing.

Jon had seen enough, he needed to make his escape. He precariously tip-toed from his hiding place toward the kitchen. Being a bookshop, there were doorways and links to all the rooms so that customers had easy access to any part of the building. Jon cursed his need for commercial income and how it would probably lead to his demise. Or worse.

He stepped past a doorway just as the intruder stepped into the next room – they would have seen him if not for one of the oddly placed books that the intruder needed to adjust so it was parallel to the edge of the table. Jon got to the kitchen where the stairs were and he took each step quietly but two at a time. He silently breathed out at the landing, and listened for the intruder. They had heavy footsteps so he could hear them wherever they went. He put his hands to his knees and then felt his heart sink.

His shoes were sprinkled with white dust. Shit. The flour. He looked back and saw the trail of white footsteps. He winced when he heard the heavy steps take a direct path to the kitchen. There was only one shot.

He opened the bedroom door and quickly raced to the other side of the bedroom and wrenched open the window. He placed his hands on the sill and then he proceeded to take his shoes off.

The footsteps reached the stairs, slow and decisively. Jon threw his shoes out the window, then ran back to the other side of the bedroom – he had a wardrobe. As he passed the TV, he unplugged the VCR, and then slipped into the wardrobe, closing it gently. The intruder finally got to the bedroom and opened the door carefully. They traced the flour footprints to the window. Their stomps shook the floorboards, causing the wardrobe to creak. Jon had to keep a check on his breathing, almost gasping.

The fear was at its tipping point. He wanted to scream. He needed to scream. What a strange body function to require a vocal attribute when that attribute may be the cause of death.

The intruder placed their gloved hands on the window sill and looked out to see if they could find their prey who, to them, had made their escape. Instead they clenched their fists and the sill wood broke in two places. They managed to pull the sill from the wall when they stood up straight. Jon considered they didn’t meant to do that.

The intruder chucked the wood to the floor. They stormed out the bedroom and their heavy footsteps receded. After five minutes, Jon resumed breathing normally, trying not to inhale dust. Then he weakly exited the wardrobe. The first thing he did was go into the bathroom and throw up into the toilet. He washed his face and hands in the sink, ignoring the ivy leaves sticking out from the plughole. He instead was focused on his face. He knew he was unrecognisable, he wasn’t even sure if the intruder had seen his face if they would know it was him, Jon.

He sighed. He knew he couldn’t call the police, they couldn’t know he was there either. There were few people he could trust. Instead he used the number of a PI that he had found in the newspaper recently that he knew memorising would come in handy. And now was better than ever.

With each ring he scratched his head, wondering if there was any knowledge he could recollect that would help him now. Anything at all, but his mind was blank. He reached someone on the other end and licked his lips before he spoke.

“Hi, is this Dirk Gently?” he croaked.


	2. I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue

Dirk took a deep breath and raised his arms up and down, stretching himself out. He then proudly stood in the middle of the road, taking in the surroundings. Old buildings, curvy roads, disgruntled citizens, he was back home. He sighed in contentment at the smell of chip oil, old tobacco, and brisk air.

Todd brought up the rear, wrenching his sweater around but still feeling cold. He was not impressed with the new surroundings.

“So, this is home?”

“Close enough,” said Dirk, “Scotland is like England but just more social.” He waved to a passing man who threw up a finger. “Ah yes, well, social between the Scottish.”

Farah had a massive backpack on and reached the three pulling Dirk’s case, “don’t forget this, or we’re leaving it here,” she said, rolling it next to him.

“Oh yes, sorry,” he said excitedly.

“I feel naked without any firearms,” said Farah, “how do people protect themselves around here.”

“Mostly by keeping their nose out of other people’s business,” replied Dirk.

“The exact opposite of what we intend to do,” said Farah, “great!”

“Well we can’t stop! Our destination lies outside of Edinburgh. Ah! Here’s our ride,” he then waved to someone stood down the road by a Ford Mustang, in bright blue. The person stood by it wore a flat cap and had a big bushy black moustache that they were touching up as Dirk approached him proudly.

Farah, noticing he didn’t grab his suitcase, shook her head and left it. But Todd picked up the pieces of morality left and took the handle of it to drag up to the car.

“Mr Gently,” said the man when they were in speaking distance, “one rental for one week. Here you are,” and he handed Dirk the keys.

“Thank you!” Dirk responded but the keys were quickly snatched by Farah.

“I’m driving,” she said in a tired voice.

“Do you even know how you drive manual?” he asked.

“Yes,” she quickly snapped.

“Make sure to drive on the left!”

“Dirk, don’t test me.”

Dirk backed off on this as Todd loaded the trunk with their bags. The man coughed as they went about their business, trying to draw attention. Todd gave him a puzzled look until Dirk gave a gesture that indicated he had remembered something. Dirk then gave the man a thick envelope to which he tipped his cap to.

“You keep her safe eh? Got to get it back to the palace in one piece,” the man said, looking into the envelope.

“Do thank them for me will you?”

“Thank them? You think they know about this?” said the man and clapped Dirk on the shoulder, “one piece alright?”

The man left them to it, much to Todd and Farah’s confusion.

“How legitimate is this rental?” asked Todd.

“It’s a very good rate for a car like this,” said Dirk, getting into the passenger seat, “that’s all that really matters. Now! Anyone have the address?”

“I’ve put it into the GPS but it’s not coming up,” said Farah, “it’s got Livingston so we can just ask for directions when we get closer,” she paused, “or when we think we’re close.”

The drive was short, Farah and Todd were surprised in the amount of time between a supposed city and a supposed town. Dirk’s explanation was that the British were ‘cosy and a chummy lot’, that ‘they preferred when their family weren’t a fifteen-hour drive away’ like they are in the states. Todd found that reasonable. Farah did not. Dirk got distracted by cows in a field and shouted ‘cows!’

The city life was replaced by farms cut up by interludes of forests and overcast skies, with a gentle spit of rain. In less than half an hour they entered the town of Livingston that Farah and Todd couldn’t really see how it was a town. The cluster of shops that made its high street were bunched together and there were very few parking lots.

“Car parks are British gold, you’ll be surprised what people pay for parking,” he said.

“Pay for parking?”

Dirk gave them a tired look, “you two have a lot to learn about my culture!”

The town wasn’t sleepy, but it wasn’t bustling. The quick switch from farmland to branded shops meant that the people traversing the street were in woolly vests and pushchairs. Todd figured that the movie Hot Fuzz had actually been a documentary more than it intended. There were actually more pubs than he expected – he’d lost count five minutes out of Edinburgh.

Farah got a little frustrated at finding their destination, in the end she began attempting to circle around the high streets, but she was growing more and more annoyed at jaywalkers.

“They just cross whenever they like! What is this backwards place,” she shouted.

“That’s the spirit, now yell a little more,” urged Dirk, getting a glance of annoyance from Farah. He turned away and suddenly became excited, “let’s stop and get some coffee.”

“We could always ask for directions,” suggested Todd.

“Park on the street Farah,” said Dirk.

He then had to guide Farah to parking on the curb, which again caused frustration as she had to perform a parallel park, of which she hadn’t done in years.

The café that Dirk had sighted had a calligraphy sign above the windows reading ‘The Botanist’. Flower blocks were sitting outside the bay windows that gave a view of the mediocre inside of the café. Dirk was already careening for the door whilst Todd took a look through the windows to scope who was in. Farah had to stop Dirk before he reached the door.

“Remember the terms of this investigation? They requested privacy, we can’t reveal anymore than we need to,” she stated.

“Yes yes, that’s fine. We’re going to just get a cup of tea, some coffee, and ask where this bookshop is meant to be,” said Dirk, slapping her away and entering.

There was a brunette woman at the counter with a square pair of glasses and a fair face, whose smile caused crinkles in such a way that if you wanted to get angry with her, the anger would evaporate like a puddle in the sun. Her dress sense was tight: leggings and t-shirt, but she also had a long-sleeved shirt tied around her front to act as a miniature apron.

“Hi!” called Dirk, “could I get a tea, two coffees, and do you know where we might find the Small Cranny?”

The woman waved, nodded and then shook her head apologetically in quick succession. She began using the machines to make the drinks as Farah and Todd entered. Todd found a table near the window to wait for the drinks.

“Not a talkative person, I can respect that. I had trouble with words as well. Like, what’s up with small talk huh? Why can’t we just all accept that sometimes you just want to get business over and done with.” Dirk sighed, and the woman chuckled, “it’s a nice place you have here, you like plants then?”

The woman nodded quickly, smiling as she did so, causing Farah, who’d been keeping an eye on Dirk, to become puzzled.

Dirk followed on, “I tried keeping plants but they kept dying, I seem to not be able to tell when a plant needs water or when it’s had too much. You know?”

The woman nodded again, bringing the drinks to the counter and ringing it up.

“You’re a very good listener,” said Dirk.

The woman lifted up fingers to show the amount on the till and Dirk fished into his pocket for the company business card, giving Farah the chance to say something.

“Are you okay?” she asked the woman.

The woman made a few quick gestures with her hands: (“I’m fine, I just can’t talk.”)

“Oh you’re deaf! I’m sorry!” said Dirk, then leant forward and spoke a little louder, “YOU ARE VERY GOOD AT LIP READING.”

The woman laughed silently and made a cross, (“I’m not deaf.”) She then made a gesture of what looked like a mouth talking and made another cross.

“She’s not deaf Dirk, she’s mute,” said Farah, “also how does shouting help a deaf person hear you.”

“Oh well I suppose it doesn’t,” said Dirk, “sorry, I get carried away.”

“Sorry, did Dirk ask you about a bookshop? Small Cranny?” inquired Farah.

The woman nodded but then shrugged, (“Sorry, I don’t know it.”)

“I guess she doesn’t know it,” said Dirk, “must be pretty elusive.”

“Makes sense if the guy wants to be on the lowdown,” said Farah.

“Thank you anyway,” said Dirk, taking the drinks back to their table.

Todd took a sip of the coffee and grimaced, “maybe we should just call the guy back and get directions from the source.”

“Ah now that is an idea,” said Dirk, pulling out his phone, “let’s give it a go!”

As he began dialling, a man approached from behind.

“Excuse me,” they said, “you mind if I can plug my laptop by your table? It’s the only socket around here.”

“Oh sure,” said Todd, standing up and giving him access.

“Thanks,” said the stranger, “I tell you, they need more outlets in this place. I love the ambiance, hate the ergonomics.”

“Hi is that Jon?” asked Dirk on the phone.

“No the name’s Lewis,” said the stranger.

“Sorry,” Dirk covered the receiver, “I’m actually on the phone.”

“Oh my bad,” said the stranger named Lewis, “it’s hard to tell you know when people are in close proximity?”

“Yes, but I’m on the phone right now so if you could-“ Dirk edged.

“Yeah no I get it, it annoys me when I’m on the phone and I have people talking right in my ear. Like, get out of my personal space, you know?” Lewis laughed.

Dirk had to cover the receiver again, “yes but now that seems to be exactly what you’re doing, and I’m trying to get directions.”

“Oh sorry, I’ve got no filter,” said Lewis, and sat down at the table beside them.

He was a young-looking man with a beard that covered half his face and what looked like frosted tips, but they’d not been done properly so were fading away at the ends of his hair. He wore his clothes casually but misplaced, as if he had picked out his wardrobe from a charity shop – a shirt with a logo for a defunct company, a t-shirt underneath for Malibu, and jeans that were a size too big held up by a leather belt.

He leant over a little as he opened his laptop, “where are you trying to get to?”

Before Farah could get a word in, Dirk had already interjected, “we’re looking for a bookshop, the Small Cranny?” Suddenly Farah’s foot met Dirk’s leg and he cried out. “Owwah! What was that?”

Farah touched her head awkwardly, “we’re just looking for a certain book.”

“Yes, my grandfather published it,” added Todd, attempting to keep it believable.

“Oh are you guys American? Must be an important book,” said Lewis, “I don’t know the Small Cranny, but I don’t know the area too well. I’ve only been here a few months.”

Dirk stood up to continue the call.

“That’s alright. I think this bookshop is pretty reclusive,” said Todd.

“Hah, perfect place to be reclusive,” continued Lewis, who seemed to just love to hear his own voice, “this is such a small town, it’s a good town to hide, or hide things. I cannot wait for my assignment to be over, there’s no major brands around here! I tried to find a hardware shop and (oh thanks Lily),” the woman from the counter had brought him a coffee and set it by his laptop, “a hardware shop and they mark up everything! Plus they hadn’t the resistors I needed! I need to get back to civilisation.”

Lewis sighed a long and tired sigh that made Todd and Farah felt a bit awkward.

“Sorry, I’ll stop bothering you guys, I just get a little lonely, I have to be ‘undercover’ and ‘discrete’,” Lewis enunciated with quotation marks, “it means I can’t have much of a social life. But they can’t interrupt my me-time right? On my time off, I can be me, right?”

“If you’re undercover, isn’t that a twenty-four hour job?” asked Farah.

“Oh well yeah, but, a guy needs a break,” said Lewis, “my current project is fixing up old retro machines. Like VCRs, cassette players, you know things from the eighties. You need anything fixed?”

Farah and Todd shook their heads.

“Yeah it’s actually a good business in a town like this, lost in time,” said Lewis, “I can make a good little side money.”

At this point, Dirk returned, “I’ve got directions!”

“Thank god,” said Farah under her breath, “good to meet you er…”

“Lewis,” said Lewis again, “in fact here, this is my repair business card. In case you need something fixed while you’re in town. You might not but I’m not going to forgo potential business!”

He pushed the card across the table which Farah picked up. It was wrinkled as if he’d had it in his pocket for a long time.

“Thanks,” said Farah putting it in her own pocket.

They waved to the counter woman and joined Dirk at the car.

“Wow, that was not what I expected,” said Todd.

“Yeah I think that guy has a few problems,” muttered Farah.

*

When they found the bookshop, hidden down the alley, out of sight, Farah found it reasonable that no one knew where it was. Hell it didn’t even look lived in; the window was smashed and the door looked battered. No books were on display either. In a way it did a very good job at being hidden. Sometimes, hiding something made it much more obvious that it was hidden. Hidden in plain sight, that was at play here.

Dirk was at the door, rapping away until Todd grabbed his hand to stop what he hadn’t realised was a pounding knock. Then the door opened with a tug and a screech of wood and metal on stone.

The man behind it was probably in his fifties, with a beard that was long and uncared for. His eyes were sharp and suspicious, and darted at all of them to take in their faces. His hair was also muddled so that it clumped together in odd places. He wore what looked like a long coat, but his pot-belly stuck out of it’s opening. Even with the pot-belly, his limbs were too thin making him look like a potato on cocktail sticks. If Farah had ever met a hermit, this would be what she imagined they’d look like.

“Are you Dirk Gently?” he asked, with a hint of a stutter under his breath.

“The one and only, and these are my associate detectives. Are you Jon?” said Dirk.

“Yes, come in,” said the man, opening the door a little wider but not fully.

The three of them entered precariously. The inside wasn’t much better than the outside, there was flour on the floor, strings tied across doorways, and books were placed in positions unappealing to the eye.

“We can go to the back in the kitchen. Mind the flour,” said Jon, leading the way through one doorway and round a corner.

The troupe followed whilst analysing their surroundings.

“I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” said Farah.

“Odd. I’ve got a good feeling,” said Dirk.

The bookshop had obviously been converted from an old townhouse, meaning new doorways had been knocked through holes and the lower rooms were converted to shelving space. The kitchen was still the same size as it must’ve been when originally built; small and cramped with a small fold out table pressed against the side. There were no windows so Jon had the light on that flickered gently.

“So,” said Jon, licking his lips, “nice weather we’re having?”

The group eyed him oddly, before Todd said, “it’s alright.”

Jon nodded, then filled a glass with water from the tap. He took a sip, then remembered he had guests and had completely forgotten there was a protocol, “would you like something to drink?”

“That’s alright we just had a coffee,” said Dirk.

Jon nodded again and darted looks around a little more. “Were you followed?”

“I don’t think so,” said Todd.

“No,” stated Farah plainly.

“Does anyone know you’re here?” asked Jon.

“We did have to ask for directions so… two people? At most?” said Dirk.

Jon made a small guttural sound that sounded like a groan but it was disguised by the fact he didn’t open his mouth, “who?”

“A girl at a coffee shop and a VCR repairman,” said Farah, “no one official.”

Jon hummed and tapped on his glass, thinking it over, “okay,” he said.

There was an awkward moment of silence where each side seemed to wait for the other to begin the conversation. Finally, Dirk broke the silence with, “so you were attacked!”

“Yes,” said Jon, “yes I want you to find out who.”

“Okay,” started off Farah, “where were you attacked?”

“Here,” and Jon gestured to the area around them, “they broke through the window and chased me upstairs. I hid in a wardrobe and he broke my windowsill,” explained Jon.

“You’ve not patched up the window,” said Farah.

“No I reasoned it would help if the attacker didn’t know I was still here. For all they know I’ve abandoned this place,” said Jon, “it was abandoned before I got here so it’s not going to draw attention.”

“How long have you been here?” asked Farah.

“I’d rather not say.”

“Okay, have you always lived in Livingston?”

“I’d rather not say.”

“You’re not leaving us a lot to go on,” said Todd.

“I don’t think that information is relevant to the case,” said Jon, “plus I’ve kept a low profile for a long time.”

“Okay, do you have any idea who it could have been that attacked you?” asked Farah.

“No,” said Jon.

“Anyone you know who might WANT to attack you? Do you have any enemies?” Farah continued.

Jon winced, and clicked his tongue, “Billboard maybe.”

“Bill Board? Who’s he?” asked Dirk.

“No, Billboard is an advertising company, they manage advertising space on websites,” said Farah, “okay did you do something to them?”

“I’d rather not say.”

Farah pressed her lips together, “this will make things really difficult.”

“I thought you could solve a case with little to nothing,” said Jon, “that’s what you suggested anyway,” and he pointed at Dirk.

“Yes, but we at least need a lead of some sort. Did you work for Billboard?”

“For a short time a while ago. We didn’t end amicably so let’s leave it at that,” said Jon.

Todd had got his phone out, “it says that Billboard’s headquarters are in Edinburgh. You’re not far from them if things didn’t end amicably.”

“You know what they say, keep your friends close and your enemies closer,” said Jon simply.

“I don’t think that’s what it means,” said Todd, unconvinced.

“Do you mind if we look around?” asked Dirk, his hands becoming restless.

“Go ahead, just be careful of the flour, and the string. I put it all like that so I know if someone’s been here when I’m not,” explained Jon.

“Do you leave all this up for the customers?” asked Dirk.

“I don’t really get customers, but yes I would,” said Jon.

“Me and Todd will start investigating, Farah you see what you can learn,” said Dirk and indicated for Todd to follow him.

Farah sighed and had in her hand a notebook to make notes, “so how do you make a living.”

“I’d rather not say.”

*

Dirk found a book on small-talk placed at an awkward angle on a coffee table and flicked through it. He uttered a sound of appreciation on a couple lines and decided he’d carry it with him. Todd, on the other hand, was focused on the window and the glass that littered the front room.

“They didn’t use a brick or anything, do you think they just threw themselves into the window?” he suggested.

“That’s a very good question Todd,” said Dirk as if he was reading from the book, “what do you think?”

“So they tried the door and then decided the window was easier,” he said, “they obviously don’t care about repercussions.”

“Or they knew Jon wouldn’t call the police so there wouldn’t be repercussions.”

“He only saw one attacker so maybe it was a hitman,” again suggested Todd.

“But why would they want him dead?” asked Dirk, asking the real questions.

“Didn’t Jon say he broke a windowsill?” reminded Todd, “where is it?”

They circled around the front room before resolving they should try upstairs, where Jon had mentioned he had hidden in a wardrobe. They could still see Jon’s footprints in the floor, followed by large boot prints that had to have belonged to his attacker. In the bedroom, Todd found the piece of wood that had come from the window frame, and the same frame of which the wood was from. He lifted it up and considered it.

“How the hell does someone rip wood from a frame like this!?” he said incredulous.

Dirk wasn’t listening, he had become excitable.

“What’s this!” he said, a touch of childlike wonder in his voice.

Todd looked away from the wood to see Dirk was looking at the VCR under the TV.

“It’s a VCR, have you never seen one of those before?” said Todd.

“No, what does it do?” asked Dirk, curious.

“It’s was before the DVD player, they were big in the nineties. You really haven’t seen one before?”

“Well I did miss a bit of the nineties being in Black Wing,” scoffed Dirk, to which Todd checked himself and felt bad.

“It uses VHS tapes to play movies like a DVD,” said Todd, putting the wood down and joining Dirk, attempting to rectify his assumption, “this one is unplugged.”

He reached over and plugged it back into the wall and the digital clock flicked back on, to an ‘oo’ from Dirk. When Todd turned back, Dirk had his finger in the VHS flap.

“There’s something in there!” he tried to prise it out using his fingers.

Todd sighed, “no, you’ll break it. You just press the eject button,” and he pressed the said button.

The VCR spat out the tape inside, causing Dirk to gasp in awe. He took out the VHS tape and considered it, “it’s like a big cassette player!”

Todd was puzzled, “wait a moment,” and he turned the tape so that he could see the sticker on the top, “it’s been labelled.”

On the white sticker used to indicate what had been recorded on the tape, was the words ‘Experiment 52 – Edinburgh Zoo’, except they’ve then been scribbled out using sharpie and ‘Ava’ was written nearby instead.

“Oh, what does that mean?” asked Dirk.

“I don’t know,” said Todd, and slipped the tape back into the VCR. He pushed rewind for a bit, causing the VCR to hum for a period and Dirk to be elated, and then pressed play.

He turned on the TV finally, turning to channel 8 and they waited.

It was static. But not the normal white static. It was frantic but riddled with long lines. And the sound wasn’t static either but random tones.

“There’s nothing on here,” reasoned Todd, “but why is it in his VCR?”

“Huh, I have a feeling this is important,” said Dirk, following Todd’s previous directions to eject the tape and pick it up, “it is most definitely a lead that’s for sure.”

“We shouldn’t take it,” said Todd.

“I feel we should,” said Dirk and slipped it into his jacket, “Jon isn’t telling us anything and we’re going to need more answers to solve this than he’s willing to give.”

Todd gave an unsure look but seeing himself the tape was empty he decided it was likely not that important.

They exited the bedroom and decided to do a further sweep of the premises. Dirk attempted to open the door directly opposite the bedroom but found the door wouldn’t budge.

“Ooh, a locked door,” he said, “how fun.”

“let me try,” said Todd, jostling Dirk out the way, and he gave a shove.

It budged but he couldn’t get it to open enough. He rattled the handle but it didn’t feel locked, just that it was blocked.

“The plot thickens,” said Dirk.

When they returned downstairs, Farah was trying to drink some water but ended up tipping it down the sink with a grimace, “the water is awful.”

“Where’s Jon?” asked Todd.

“He’s just in the other room, looking at books. I couldn’t get anything else of use from him so I guess all we have is Billboard.”

“And this,” said Dirk, showing the VHS tape in his jacket, “Edinburgh Zoo. I think we should try there next.”

Farah nodded impressed.

“Say Jon!,” called Dirk, moving from the kitchen towards the front, finding Jon looking at a book that read ‘Russian for Beginners’, “we tried to get into the room upstairs and it was locked. What are you hiding up there?”

Jon shook his head, “I’m not hiding anything in there, if you want to see it,” he said, gesturing in front of him leading the way back upstairs, “this is another thing that I don’t understand.”

When they reached the door again, Jon pushed against it, making more headway than Todd and Dirk made. Farah joined in the effort and soon they got the door open enough to be able to step inside. Jon then stepped back to let the three of them take a look.

Dirk took the lead and entered, slipping round the door, and gasping in confusion.

“Wow,” he said, and Todd and Farah were right behind to also agree with the cries of surprise.

It was a bathroom. It was probably a fine bathroom, covered in cream tiles. It had a shower, a bathtub, a toilet, a small sink basin, and a cabinet with a mirror hanging on the wall. No, it WAS hanging on the wall at some point (they could see the nail in the wall) but it now was on the floor, the shards of glass spread from its impact. But most importantly, coating every visible surface and causing the air to taste much more damp and eerie, was ivy. Ivy growing around the entire bathroom, all coming from the pipes beneath the sink.

“Holy shit,” said Todd.

“Oh yeah,” said Jon, “that wasn’t there when I called you. Yesterday I heard the cabinet smash and well,” and he gestured to the ivy, “now my bathroom is the plant’s.”

“Huh,” said Todd.

“Huh indeed,” replied Jon.

*

The trio left by the front door ready to head to the next destination.

“We’ll be checking up on the leads we have,” said Dirk to Jon, who was seeing them off.

“Thank you,” said Jon, “I’ll be staying here when you need me.”

“We will be in touch,” said Dirk.

Jon gave a grim nod and then attempted to close his door. Once out of earshot Dirk called them to huddle together. He then procured the VHS out of his jacket to assist in explaining his plan to Farah.

“We need to check out the Edinburgh Zoo,” he said, “this tape must mean something.”

“It is suspicious, but we should also ask around Billboard about Jon,” reasoned Farah.

“Maybe you’re right, maybe we should also stop by Billboard HQ. You think-“

Suddenly the door opened again to the bookshop and Jon ambled his way into the street, his eyes darting everywhere. Dirk quickly stuffed the tape back into his jacket.

“Actually,” he rasped, “maybe it’d be safer if I come with you. Just in case.”

“No no, that’s quite alright-“

“Else I’ll be staying in a broken into home-“

“We’ve got this really-“

“I insist, it is my case-“

“I think that’s probably a good idea,” said Farah.

Dirk gave her a look of displeasure but switched it to a smile as best he could, “yes, maybe you’re right.”

“So where are we going?” asked Jon, looking over his shoulder checking the bookshop.

“Well we were-“ began Dirk, but Farah interrupted.

“We were going to split up. You should go with Dirk to Billboard,” said Farah.

“Why where are you going?” asked Jon, narrowing his eyes.

“The police,” at which Jon almost made like he was going to protest, “relax we’re going to be nondescript and we’re going to poke into their records.”

Jon relented, “right. Maybe I should stay behind…” he trailed off.

“If you don’t feel comfortable going to see Billboard, I understand,” said Dirk, to which Jon gave him another look.

“No, I,” he muttered to himself, “I don’t think they’d recognise me anyway. It’s been a while.”

Dirk again squeezed his thumbs and tried to force a smile out, “okay! Well then let’s take a drive! Todd, Farah, we’ll meet you at the hotel.”

Todd and Farah agreed and they split off from one another.

Dirk attempted some small talk with Jon who also attempted to return it. Meanwhile Farah and Todd whispered to one another.

“He wants to go back to Billboard? Didn’t he say they might be the guys after him?” asked Todd.

“He doesn’t WANT to go back, he’s following Dirk.”

“Following Dirk? You think he trusts him?”

“I think the opposite,” said Farah, “I’m fairly certain he knows Dirk has his tape.”


	3. Birds in a Cage

Bobby was a considerate man, calm and considerate. He found he could keep this demeanour by taking five minutes in his day and running through routine breathing exercises. Nothing complex, just eight seconds breathe in, hold for five, breathe out for seven seconds, and repeat. He had a little trouble, and most people do, in that when counting he sometimes sped up or slowed down without realising it. He tried to count elephants but then he’d forget and then count thousands, and thousands and elephants are very different things.

What Bobby didn’t realise was it wasn’t the breathing exercise that kept him calm, but the subsequent confusion that kept him in thought as he tried to reconcile elephants and thousands. And when he’d come out of the discussion in his head, reasoning that he should just stick to thousands next time, he would’ve forgotten all about the thing that was stressing him out.

At this point in time, the thing that attempted to stir some feelings of stress was the call on the radio from their superior, who sounded as if they were tearing the hair from their head, nose and armpits so that there’d be nothing to fall out after the situation resolved itself. He waited in the patrol car for his current partner to return.

She eventually returned from the petrol station with a packet of crisps and a pepsi – she handed Bobby the pepsi.

“They didn’t have cherry flavoured,” said Missy, “so it’s normal.”

Chirpy, excited, and a cinephile. Missy was constantly reminded that the police service was not the one she had seen on TV, and she was slowly getting accustomed to slow and methodical life of a special constable. This however did stop her from marking where real life matched to her expectations, and subsequently spoiling each action film that had been created in movie history. She also did this weird thing where she always ate food upside-down.

“That’s alright,” said Bobby, and opened it up to take a sip.

Afterward, he braced himself to give Missy the news.

“We’ve got to go check something out,” he said plainly, “a possible stolen car.”

“Cool,” said Missy, “are going to have to chase someone down the M1?”

“Hopefully not,” said Bobby, pulling out from the petrol station into traffic, “it’s one of the royal cars.”

He readied himself as Missy turned slowly, eyes wide open, and screamed, “no fucking way!”

“I knew you’d say that,” he said, “its been sighted in Livingston so we have to go check it out.”

“This is un-fucking-believable, how did they steal a royal car!? Are we going to bust a crew of fast and angry drivers? Potentially even furious?”

Bobby sighed, “hopefully not. The guys upstairs have an idea who’s got it.”

“Aw, can we at least chase them over a railroad or something?” moaned Missy, pressing her head back into the headrest.

“It’s a royal car, you think we can afford it being damaged?” Bobby shook his head, “they say the guy is probably reasonable.”

“Boo,” groaned Missy, “fine but we should get him to talk just in case.”

“Talk? About what?”

“The obvious heist they have planned. I bet he’s planning to steal a truck of expensive cathode TVs,” said Missy, “you know like-“

“Stop,” silenced Bobby, “I swear. Anyway, supe said the guy doesn’t do that kind of shit. He mainly just… meddles.”

“Meddles?”

“Meddles,” repeated Bobby, “but do be on your toes. They said he’s not dangerous but somehow, every time, the police end up in some kind of danger.”

“Like what?”

Bobby shook his head, turning off the main road for a B road heading to Livingston, “they didn’t say. Just be aware.”

*

Dirk awkwardly walked alongside Jon on the pavement. He wasn’t sure how to keep the conversation going and after the car ride, he was feeling a bit of a divide was occurring between him and Jon. What tipped him off was the various shouts of ‘watch out for that cat’, ‘you’re going to hit him’, and ‘stop!’. In fact, that last phrase had been uttered so much, it had begun to get on Dirk’s nerves, and it was very difficult to get on Dirk’s nerves. He noted he’d have to wipe off the print of Jon’s face on the passenger window, which Jon had rudely left for him to do.

“You are English right?” ascertained Jon, still trying to keep his balance.

“Yes, obviously, can’t you hear it?” said Dirk.

“You were on the wrong side of the road long enough to make me doubt it.”

Dirk hushed him and they reached their destination, the large office block of which Billboard was housed. Through the revolving doors was a large hall lobby littered with modern art and a great listing of companies that existed in the building. Billboard was not the top, nor was it in the middle. No it had the lowest two floors, and Dirk noticed that the third floor had been painted over.

They approached the receptionist who sat up in their seat, a pert smile on their face as they considered the newcomers. They greeted Dirk and Jon with a gesture and a ‘hi, how can I help.’

“Hi, could you let us up into Billboard? My name is Dirk Gently; I’m a detective,” he stated, “and this is my cohort.”

He gestured to Jon. The receptionist looked at Jon, their eyes moving up and down, taking him in. It had been Dirk’s suggestion to get a disguise. Mainly for the face. And this consisted of sport sunglasses, a scarf, and a wide-berth sunhat. It would have made sense if it were the summer, but it was February.

“I see, can I see your badge?” asked the receptionist, picking up the phone.

“Ah well I don’t really have a badge per say, I’m not a police detective more a,” and he struggled to search for a suitable word in his head. Holistic didn’t seem to convey the right feeling at this point in time.

The receptionist suddenly adjusted their head, “oh wait, I understand,” they said.

Dirk and Jon gave looks of surprise, “you do?”

“Not an issue Mr Gently, I was expecting you,” said the receptionist, dialling, and then speaking into the receiver, “hi Clara, the inspectors are here. I’ll be sending them up.” Putting the phone down, the receptionist fished for two cards and passed them to Dirk and Jon, “write your names on these cards so we can record them in case of an emergency and then take the lift to the left.”

Dirk and Jon thanked them and then approached the barriers of which a quick swipe of the card let them through. They entered the elevator without a sweat.

“That was a lot easier than it has ever been,” said Dirk, “they were expecting us?”

“I knew they’d recognise me,” said Jon, muttered under his breath.

They reached the first floor where there was another reception area, with the logo for Billboard in acrylic stuck to the wall. Except the B was starting to fall off and was making the sign look a little disjointed. Almost immediately a new face appeared.

A woman in her forties dressed in business attire, her hair wadded into a bun, a square pair of glasses on her nose, and the vague perfume of jasmine wafted from her. She had a smile stapled to her face, covering up another face beneath that neither Dirk or John could determine. She reached out a hand to which Dirk accept and she shook it firmly. When she spoke, her voice was trill and trying, like a teacher who’d told the kids at the back of the classroom to stop throwing paper around and they’d responded by throwing a chair through the window.

“Ah I was wondering when exactly you’d turn up,” she said.

“I can explain,” began Jon, resigned to his fate.

“No, no, early or late is fine with us right now! Prepared for anything, anything at all!” said the woman, “I am Helga Whittacker, CEO. Our accounts have been gathered and put into one of our meeting rooms for you.”

“Accounts?” asked Dirk, confused. Jon also looked puzzled.

“Sorry, financial records. The accounts. Not as in accounts of what happened. If anything has happened, which it hasn’t!” Helga laughed, “this way.”

Dirk and Jon followed without questioning the woman.

The meeting room had clouded glass walls and was centred in the open floor plan of the office. Around them were people working on computers, glued to screens, idle chit chatter. Inside the meeting room, the soft ambiance dissipated.

“If you need anything to drink you can ask reception, and if you need me, I’ll be in my office,” said Helga, straining to keep the smile up as she exited.

When she left Dirk and Jon looked at one another incredulously.

“They didn’t recognise me,” said Jon.

“And they just let us walk in,” said Dirk, “I think they think we’re someone else.”

Jon sighed and dropped into a chair, putting his head to his hand, “I can’t believe I’m back here.”

*

There is a story of a man who once owned a bird. A budgie, a parrot, this changes between each telling, but the bird is in a cage. The man enjoys the company of the bird and loves it very much. A friend comes to visit, sees the bird, and suggests that the man should let the bird out of its cage so that it may fly about the room. They say it is cruel to hold it inside such a small cage. The man, wishing the best for his bird, lets the bird out.

Another friend visits and sees the bird flying about the room. They say the man should let the bird fly about the whole house as it is cruel to confine it such a small room. The man agrees, wanting what is best for the bird, and so opens the doors to let the bird fly about the house.

Yet another friend visits (obviously this man has many friends and often invites them round for afternoon tea) and sees the bird flying about the house. They say the man should let the bird out of the house; that it is cruel to confine the bird to the building.

And the story goes on and becomes even less believable. The man builds a hotel, he builds a tower, he builds a gigantic aviary, he buys an island, he buys a country and finally he lets the bird fly wherever it wants.

And after all this, he finds that the bird returns to its cage to sleep every night.

The moral has been lost to the ages, and it doesn’t really add much to any discussion about zoos. Todd only thought about it because as he and Farah watched the parrots in their pen, he couldn’t imagine loving a bird as much as the man did.

“How dangerous do this case is going to be?” asked Farah after a short period of silence.

Todd raised an eyebrow, “you think this’ll become dangerous?”

“They’re always dangerous,” she reasoned, “what do you think, seventeen-man army? Military involvement? How many people do you think will die while we investigate.” Todd just stared at her. “I’m not being sarcastic. I mean, I am joking, I don’t actually mean for anyone to die, but it seems to be an inevitability.”

Todd shrugged, “…maybe a six out of ten?”

“Six?”

“Six and a half,” Todd looked back at the parrots, “are you feeling anything holistic yet?”

“Nothing,” said Farah, “really we need Dirk here, we don’t really have the same abilities he does.”

“It might have rubbed off on us,” said Todd.

“Well what do you feel?”

“I feel like I don’t like birds,” said Todd shaking his head.

“Yeah nobody likes the aviary,” said a raspy voice from behind Todd, “I don’t mean to overhear. But you’re right here. And so was I.”

The man it belonged to was short and stout, almost like a teapot. His neck was missing, his arms were hairy, and he wore a large cap with the Edinburgh zoo logo on it, which went well with the branded jumpsuit he also wore. He was leaning forward slightly as if constantly craning himself to hear conversations.

“Hi,” uttered Todd, “sorry no the aviary is fine, I just-“

“Don’t like birds. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get you, yeah,” the man was eyeing the two of them, “I’m not really interested in animals myself. Nah, nah, nah, people are the interesting ones. Having conversations. Near bird cage.”

Todd looked at Farah and then tipped his head in the man’s direction, before asking him, “who are you?”

“I’m Martins. Park keeper. One of them. I clean. I also watch people. I’m a people watcher.”

“You haven’t seen anyone suspicious around here have you?” asked Farah.

“Or anything unusual that you couldn’t explain?” asked Todd.

“Yeah! Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wait, no. Not really,” said Martins, licking his lips.

“Would you know if there’s any labs around here, where they perform experiments?” asked Todd.

“Nah. Nah, no, nah. No, nah. Nah. Nah. Nah.”

“Wait yeah, you mean the university building? Like research? Students are doing all sorts,” Martins went on.

“Like what?” asked Farah.

“I think its Giraffe mating ritual right now,” said Martins, “why you like Giraffes?”

“We’re writing an article for a scientific journal,” explained Farah.

“Right, right. Yeah. On giraffes? Yeah okay. Yeah, it’s the university building. The other side of the park. Yeah,” said Martins, and he licked his lips, “yeah they run projects of all kinds. Nothing bad for the animals. No, no. It’s rituals. It’s boring.”

“Well we want to go ask them some questions so-“

“People are much more interesting. People do weird stuff. People have birthday parties. People have small-talk. People stand in front of bird cages talking for ages,” Martins wagged his eyebrows, “not like animals. Animals are predictable. Like Peter.”

“Peter?”

“You know about Peter?”

“No, you just mentioned him.”

“How do you know his name?”

Farah had an exasperated look on her face that Todd recognised when Dirk would start to ge ton her nerves, “you just said his name was Peter.”

“Peter the parrot?”

“I don’t know, I’m asking you!” said Farah, to which Todd put a hand on her shoulder to take over as good cop.

“Who is Peter?” asked Todd.

“Peter the parrot. Like clockwork. Flies over here in the morning. Flies away at 2pm every day. Without fail. You can tell its Peter because he says,” and then Martins looked up, “hah, I’ve heard it so much I forgot what he says. When you hear him, you know it’s him.”

“Where is he now?” asked Todd.

Martins lifted a finger and pointed up on the cage. Then he whirled his finger about in the sky and settled on another cage. And then he stopped and looked back. “I don’t know.”

“Okay, we should be heading to the university building then,” said Farah.

As they began to back away slowly, Martins had his eyes closed and finger in the air as if he was waiting for something to hit him like a ton of bricks.

“Wait. Wait. No,” he opened his eyes, then closed them, “wait. Yes. Listen. Yeah, he’s around. Don’t know where, but you can hear him.”

Farah and Todd stopped in their tracks. They looked around and listened for what Martins could hear. It was just random cackling and squawking. The birds all around them were making noise and none were distinguishable. Until one, very faint and very soft call, that was definitely the voice of a parrot, became clearer to them both. It was coming from somewhere but they couldn’t tell where.

It almost definitely sounded like it was saying ‘I hope this works’ over and over.

*

“If I was Farah, which I realise I have absolutely the wrong body type for,” said Dirk, “I would say we’re looking in the wrong place.”

He was leant back on a chair, his feet on the table, chewing on some gum he’d found in his pocket. He had been very pleased on finding the gum. He found chewing looked cooler. He’d done a trial without chewing gum, but it definitely upped his coolness by about ten percent.

Jon was looking at the accounts tiredly and hearing Dirk say this became irate.

“Are you kidding. You’ve not looked at anything, I’m the one reading these,” he said.

“And have you found anything of use?” asked Dirk, knowing full well the answer. When Jon didn’t answer, Dirk stood up, “no if our CEO thinks we’re auditors, she’s given us information that she expects auditors want and hidden information she doesn’t want them to find out. But not just that, she wouldn’t have given information that wasn’t relevant. But she doesn’t know that we’re not auditors, and so there’s a chance she will give us information she thinks is irrelevant to an auditor but relevant to us!”

“But-“ began Jon, but Dirk had already opened the door for the meeting room and was looking around.

Before Jon could stop him, Dirk had left the meeting room in such a manner that if anyone had seen him he would have looked suspicious. He made of discomfort and followed Dirk.

Dirk walked through the office in such a way that Jon was surprised that no one took notice of. It was a fast walk, suspicious, and incredibly obvious, and yet know one batted an eyelid. Jon was in awe that Dirk was managing to get away with this, when he had spent a long time learning the ins and outs of not getting noticed. And here was Dirk, flouting all his expertise, throwing it to the wind, and nobody gave a shit. It was frustrating.

Dirk finally found what he was looking for, the office door marked ‘Helga Whittacker: CEO’ and rapped on the wood.

“Come in,” called Helga from inside.

Dirk opened it, gesturing for Jon to follow, which Jon scampered over and followed into the room.

“Ah how can I help?” asked Helga, “is everything satisfactory.”

Dirk took a seat in one of the chairs in front of desk and Jon followed suit, looking entirely uncomfortable. Helga judged him but retained her focus on Dirk.

The room looked bare, save for a poster behind Helga’s desk with a cartoon kitten on it, her desk that was flat littered with paper and pens, and a waste bin sat to its left. Dirk took the opportunity to take out his gum and throw it deftly into the bin. Except it got stuck to his finger and so he flung his hand around until he took the wrapper from his pocket, wrapped it and chucked it at the bin. And missed. So he got up and tried again. And again. Finally he knelt beside the bin and placed the gum inside and got back into his chair, sighing.

“I wanted to ask about an employee you had here a few years ago,” said Dirk.

Jon threw his head toward Dirk, staring daggers into the side of Dirk’s head.

“Absolutely we hire contractors and developers from all over,” explained Helga, “they often work short-term.”

“Do you remember someone named Jon?” asked Dirk.

Jon put a hand over his face.

“Oh,” said Helga, “oh yes I remember, yes,” she chuckled but painfully, “yes I expect you’re interested because that’s when the numbers go bad right?”

Dirk leant forward intrigued, “yes of course, yes the numbers. Why is that?”

Helga sighed and put her hands together, “well it’s no secret that things haven’t been going well for us since then. You see…” and she paused to think of the words, “he broke a server of ours.”

Jon looked disgruntled but managed not to make a scene. In his head, a rage was brewing.

“Broke a server?” asked Dirk.

“Yes we hired him as an engineer to fix it and he broke it instead,” Jon bit his knuckles, “which has messed everything since. We’ve not been able to recover.” Helga rapped on the table, “you see we manage advertising space and before our algorithms would take data and carefully tailor the ads to see perfectly. Nowadays, we’ve done what we can.”

Helga tapped away at her keyboard quickly and adeptly, saying, “for example, if you go online shopping and search for coffee makers, then,” and she turned her computer screen around to show Dirk and Jon, where she displayed the search results and on the right pane was some adverts for coffee makers, “you see it recognises that you want to buy a coffee maker!”

Without taking the screen back, she typed some more, “but if I search for the generic phrase ‘gifts for my girlfriend’, you’d expect it to show adverts for chocolates, or flowers, but instead…”

She pressed enter and the search results changed.

“Oh my god!” said Dirk, “but wouldn’t that hurt!?”

“Oh yes, I mean I can understand in some case why someone would want something like this, but the average person searching for gifts aren’t necessarily going to be looking for a worktop vice grip,” she tilted her head, “maybe they like some things. But yes, the algorithm hasn’t been working as well as we’d like since. So, sales have been shaky.

“Not to mention our translations.”

“Ah yes, the translations,” Dirk continued to egg on, “they also have been more and more inaccurate.”

“They look fine but we’re having real trouble with translations of relative clauses, we can’t process prepositions anymore, and don’t get me started on idioms.”

“Translations and advertising,” said Dirk, “it’s an odd combination of fields you have.”

“Michelin does tyres and restaurant ratings,” said Helga, “we do language translation and advertising space. Potatoes and tomatoes,” she swayed her finger side to side, “we have regretted the hiring of Jon Carlyle since.”

Dirk nodded, “I don’t suppose you’ve taken any steps to reprimand him?”

“Reprimand him? Hell I don’t know where he is now,” said Helga, “in the meantime we’ve just tried to struggle on.”

“But if you did know where he was…” urged on Dirk.

Helga fiddled with a pen of hers, “well I doubt that would happen. Things didn’t end amicably between us. And I don’t hold that against him. I’d leave that to…” and she trailed off, lost on a train of thought that had missed its station, “leave it to the authorities,” she finally stated.

“Huh,” said Dirk, “so do they have a lead on him or something?” he casually suggested.

“Oh, er, no, no, we decided that,” and Helga laughed as if she’d realised she was on a topic she’d rather not talk about, “hah hah, we decided to let bygones be bygones. Even if things have gone downhill since, we-“ she paused, sniffed, and carried on, “we thought it best to move on and…”

Helga finally realised that she had the power in the conversation, “I’m sorry, I think we’re getting off track. Do the payments all match up? Do the accounts read fine?”

Dirk, knowing his time was up, stood out of his chair, “yes, yes no I was just curious, thank you!”

“Of course, let me know if you need anything else,” she said and waved them out.

Dirk and Jon left the room and as soon as they were outside Jon leant into Dirk’s ear.

“What the hell was that,” he said.

“I was trying to determine if they still wanted you! Apparently not, but I still don’t see what happened between you, what did you break?” said Dirk.

“Break,” and Jon scoffed, “I broke bugger all. They were-“ and he stopped himself, “is that all?”

“Well, no,” said Dirk, and fetched into his pocket, pulling out a crumpled piece of paper, “I also got this from the bin.”

Jon looked at him in shock, “I didn’t see you grab that.”

“Misdirection,” said Dirk, “and I was already down there anyway. Let’s go shall we?”

*

“Oh I saw them alright. Four of them in total,” said the woman, clutching her cat, who was struggling to break free, “they stood in the road and then left.”

“Could you describe them for us?” asked Bobby, making rough notes in his notebook.

They were in a street that looked like an alley, talking to a woman who lived across from the Small Cranny bookshop. She looked like she had only put on a nightgown because she had company, and she had probably been in next to nothing prior.

“There was a black woman, two white men, and the black man who I see go into that bookshop every so often. I dunno if he owns it,” she said, “Mittens knock it off!”

Bobby licked his pen, “any defining characteristics?”

“One of the white men was all gangly and the other had huge eyes. The black woman had lovely hair, up to here!” and she tried to point above her but had to drop her cat. She called out in surprise as the cat began to run down the street, but Missy grabbed it before it got too far. The cat struggled.

“Shall I put her somewhere?” asked Missy, “oodle boodles.”

“Could you take her inside? You can put her in the kitchen, shut the door for me.”

Missy followed the woman’s directions as Bobby continued the interview.

“And the black man?”

“He looked like he’d not had a haircut in years. Wore baggy clothes. Older,” the woman rattled off, folding her arms, “possibly a drug addict. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a crack den.”

“I don’t think so,” said Bobby, “but thank you. Do you know where they went?”

“The old one and the gangly one took the car, the other two went the other way. I think they were a couple,” said the woman, “whispering into each other’s ears.”

Bobby took it all down and then finished with a flourish of a full stop.

“Any maps or plans,” asked Missy as she passed by to stand next to Bobby.

“They just talked,” said the woman, “they might’ve made a plan while talking.”

“Have they got any cathode TVs in there?” asked Missy, thumbing at the bookshop.

The woman looked confused but Bobby raised a hand to stop her, “don’t worry, she’s joking. Thank you Ms Baker.”

They left the woman alone and walked to the bookshop.

“Do you want to see your girlfriend whilst you’re in town?” asked Missy, “I could do with a coffee.”

“We’re not that far behind them,” said Bobby, “what happened here do you think? Why didn’t this get reported?”

“Maybe it is a crack den,” suggested Missy, “should we investigate?”

“Let’s see if there’s anyone in,” said Bobby, and he approached the door.

He rapped on the front door and waited for the adequate period of time for someone to get out of the shower, put on a towel, and rush to the door. When none of that occurred, he nodded to Missy, “no one’s home.”

He walked up to the broken window and peered in as far as he dared. Missy watched him with not so much a ‘keen’ interest, more an interest that was ‘pretty tired and liked you more as a friend’. Her interest was seeing other people. Her interest was in an open relationship with the case.

“There’s a white powder on the floor,” noted Bobby.

“Coke?” Missy proclaimed.

“Possibly,” Bobby looked around, “we can’t enter without a warrant, but we could certainly get one. Call it in would you?”

Missy went back to the patrol car to call the station as Bobby kept an eye out for the returning occupant. It seemed strange to him that the bookshop’s owner had been an accomplice in a car theft. Perhaps the car thief and the drug addict were just good friends.

He rubbed his chin and frowned; he didn’t like this. Something felt off. He took a look around.

At the end of the alley was a figure heavily clothed to the point where Bobby couldn’t identify them. They had a coat, a hood, a face-mask, a pair of goggles; every inch on them was clothed. They were standing still, almost watching him. Bobby would have called out, but the figure turned around and walked out of sight.

Missy came back, “warrant’s on the way.”

“Great,” said Bobby, “did you see the guy that up the street?”

Missy pouted and looked where Bobby was pointing before shrugging, “nah, was it our guy?”

“No,” said Bobby, “I don’t know who it was.”

*

The woman that Todd and Farah approached had glasses and a dress that said ‘too busy to dress formal’ yet ‘too important to dress casual’; it was short and gave her room to perform the splits if need be, yet she also wore heels meaning if she did perform the splits the heel would likely break before she hit the floor.

She looked up from her staring match with the floor and smiled to the pair, taking out a pair of Bluetooth earphones to give them her full attention.

“Hi,” began Farah, “this is the university building?”

“For the Edinburgh Zoo, yes, how can I help?” the woman responded.

“We’re wondering do you have any information on an Ava? She might have been conducting experiments here in the 90s,” asked Todd.

The woman shook her head, “Ava? No I don’t recognise the name, but the 90s would have been around twenty years ago, people do come and go,” said the woman.

“Anyone recently?” asked Todd.

“No not even in our giraffe mating ritual research. We have an Alice?” asked the woman, “which is me, I’m Alice. Hi.”

“What about a Jonathan Carlyle, does that name ring a bell?” asked Farah.

“No, sorry, are you looking for some specific research?” asked Alice.

Todd and Farah looked at one another, before Farah went on, “No we’re looking for a link between Edinburgh Zoo and Jonathan Carlyle.”

“If there is one I don’t know it,” said Alice, “the department is small as well, we don’t get a lot of zoology funding.”

Todd and Farah sighed. They were at a dead end. Any link that may have existed was probably gone now, twenty years too late. Farah turned away and was about to leave when Todd decided a last minute act of madness might help.

“How about Peter the parrot, do you know anything about him?”

Alice eyes lit up, “oh Peter? Oh yes, he’s a staple of the zoo, always flies back around here at 6pm you know?”

Todd felt he was onto something, “why does he do that?”

Alice readied herself to tell what looked like was a story, “well it was about twenty years ago, he was selected to be in a project by Professor Henry Miller? He was doing zoological neurology experiments. The poor bird has been flying about seemingly since, always going back to Miller’s old office, which is now my office. Always goes into his cage at night you know! He is so darling.”

Todd continued, “and he had no involvement with an Ava or a Jon?”

“No I don’t think so,” said Alice.

“Could we talk to this Professor Miller?” asked Todd.

Alice laughed at that, “well that’s be impossible.”

“Why?”

“Well he’s been missing for… well about twenty years in fact.”


	4. A Thousand Elephants

_Magnus Magnusson had his head sitting in his left palm, considering the young man before him. When the camera call came for ‘action’, he looked up at his camera, smiling. The lights were on him and his participant. It was time._

_“We’re happy to broadcast this very special episode of Mastermind. I have with me our champion from last month, who achieved our highest score recorded – 45 points!” he smiled, “abnormally our champion asked for no passes and answered every question correctly.”_

_The young man across from him chuckled, moving themselves around at the sudden feeling of embarrassment._

_“So obviously we had many calls and letters saying that it was impossible. After a little pressure, we got you back in to play again,” Magnus stated, “ready to prove it wasn’t a fluke?”_

_“I’ll give it a go,” said the champion, pressing their hands together, “I’m not really that clever, I don’t have a degree or anything.”_

_“And yet your knowledge knows no bounds,” admitted Magnus, “do you regular pub quizzes?”_

_“I’ve gone to a few.”_

_“Naturally. Are you ready to start?”_

_“Ready as I’ll ever be!”_

_“Alright, Jon, let’s begin the first round – Indo-European language families.”_

_*_

Todd wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he knew he’d know it when he found it. At the moment, he was flicking through paper extremely bored.

“So this was everything that was in his office?” asked Farah, referring to the storage room they were in.

Shelves were stacked with boxes of paper, binders, folders, and there were also pieces of medical equipment like thermometers, a stethoscope, what look like an old oscillator, and some other old pieces of junk from the nineties.

“Yeah, this was all that was moved out, plus a few other things from all around,” admitted Alice, “you think there’s something important here? They tried selling the research they found and all that’s stored away, we’re not sure what relevance any of this has.”

“To zoological neurology?” asked Farah, aiming to confirm what Alice had said earlier.

“Yeah, Henry was a big nut on the brains,” said Alice, “me I prefer just habits. Watching what people do is more interesting than knowing why. And a bit easier.”

Todd found a box with an old computer in it, which peaked his interest as it was yellowing and heavy and looked to be the only computer in the room. When trying to pull it out, he found there was a cord still attached to it. Following the cord, he found a strange spider-like piece of work with metallic plates on its legs. Trying to pull it out the box proved more effort than it looked – the thing was heavy.

“Hey Alice, what’s this?” Todd asked, resigning it was stuck.

“Just Henry’s old computer,” said Alice, “I think it’s broken. It suffered some kind of electrical surge a while back so it can’t boot.”

Todd considered it. The spider legs were custom made, there was no manner of a brand on it.

“What is this thing?” he asked and looked it around. Then he set it on his head. The six plates fit snugly around his forehead and temples. “Does it look good?”

“Probably something to do with old brain analysis. Like a makeshift CAT scanner,” said Farah.

“Pretty cool,” said Todd, “and smart.”

“He was a weird guy,” said Alice, “kept to himself a lot and worked late.”

“There might be a clue on it,” said Todd, “maybe we can get this fixed.”

“Alright well first off, a clue to what? Henry Miller’s disappearance? That’s not the case we’re on. Second, who could fix such an old computer,” said Farah, but then she frowned and touched her pocket.

Todd saw this and the pieces clicked in his head, causing a smile to appear on his face, “everything’s connected.”

Farah sighed, pulling out the business card for the man they’d met in the coffee shop: Lewis Faraday. Retro technology repair, VCRs, cassette players, old computers. Rates variable.

“So, what? We get this rando to fix this computer?” said Farah.

“Worth a shot,” said Todd, “can we take this?” he proffered the question to Alice, gesturing to the computer.

“Sorry, it’s zoo property. It’ll have to stay here, but you can bring in this guy if you like,” said Alice.

“Thanks,” said Todd, “we should ring, get him to fix it and we meet back up with Dirk at the hotel. Maybe he’s had some luck too.”

As he left the storeroom Farah had a puzzled look, “you think we’ve had luck?”

*

“A man breaks into Jon’s home. Jon had worked for Billboard and broke the servers that provide many of its services, but Billboard never pressed charges. And the disappearance of Henry Miller, a parrot that flies around Edinburgh Zoo like clockwork, an old computer, a VHS tape labelled Ava, and ivy that grew out of Jon’s bathroom. So far, we’ve collected loose threads, but not anything that ties them together,” Dirk stated.

“That’s how it starts right?” said Todd, looking over the vending machine in front of him.

He’d had to look up what a Snickers was. He’s already messed up with the Milky Way.

They were back at the hotel, centred in Edinburgh. It was a nice four-star affair, which Dirk had charged back to Jon as part of the expenses of their investigation. Leaving Jon in Dirk’s room gave them a chance to talk, while Jon tried to tidy himself up; something he’d not done in a while.

They were stood out in front on the street talking over the case.

“We still don’t have a good lead on who is after Jon or why,” said Farah, “moving him was a good idea, but they’re still out there.”

“Billboard has the motive, even if the CEO said they weren’t interested in him anymore. That could’ve been a lie,” said Todd, “they might have more on him than we think.”

“Which reminds me,” said Dirk, and he pulled out the report he’d gotten from Helga’s bin, “we do have this.”

He gave it to Todd who screwed up his face, “what is this? This looks like-“

“Russian. And Welsh. And Sanskrit,” said Dirk, “three languages. One report. And then we have the mindless scribbles from Helga.”

On the crumpled paper there were red handwritten notes, pointing and underlining some phrases. The notes were mainly symbols, questions marks, exclamation marks, and one phrase of ‘need to be better at writing reports’. It must’ve have ended up being useless to Helga, and so she threw it in the bin.

“How do we translate this?” asked Todd.

“Just use an app,” said Farah, “I’ll pull up Babel.”

“If that’s the app that Billboard runs…” said Dirk, “I’m not sure it will work.”

Farah pulled out her phone and used the camera to translate the document. There were a couple of seconds as it recognised it. Then a few seconds of Farah reading the output. Then she looked up.

“’The readouts are star-fruit in a whale of the of pristine glass small-talk’,” she read aloud, “that makes no sense.”

Dirk laughed. Todd also chuckled, “maybe the pristine glass is a clue.”

“Alright, translation is no good,” said Farah, “so we need someone who knows Russian. And Welsh. And Sanskrit,” she huffed, “this is starting to be the worst case so far. We’ve got nothing.”

“Perhaps no,” said Dirk, “we have another option.”

Todd and Farah raised their eyebrows.

“The easiest way to identify the assailant would be to actually grab the assailant. We use Jon as bait, wait for them to come and grab them!”

“You’d be putting Jon in danger. There’s no way he’d agree to that,” said Farah, “hell I wouldn’t agree to that!”

“Well then what do we do? Hope that a lead comes out of nowhere?” suggested Dirk, erratically.

And just as if the universe had heard him, a hand slapped on Dirk’s shoulder and another grabbed his wrist.

“Dirk Gently, you’re under arrest,” came the person, grabbing his other hand.

Dirk was in shock, crying out in surprise. Farah and Todd shouted out in denial.

“What’s going on!” said Todd.

Missy stepped to the side, “he doesn’t look anything like Jason Statham, or Dwayne Johnson,” she said disappointed.

Bobby, the officer that now had Dirk in handcuffs, began reading him his rights, finishing off, “you’ll have to come with us to the station.”

“Why am I under arrest, what is all this?” Dirk called out, not resisting but trying his best to make sense of the situation.

“How on earth did this guy steal Prince William’s car?” asked Missy, “we’ll need you two to come as well. We can’t charge you, but we’ve got questions. I think. Do either you have any cool tattoos?”

“Wait, stole the car? Dirk, the car is stolen!?” Todd exclaimed.

“I obviously didn’t know that! Ouch,” said Dirk, as Bobby pushed him into the back of the police car.

“Do you see the other guy?” called Bobby.

“No,” said Missy, until the doors to the hotel opened and out stepped Jon, fresh-faced and washed. He’d shaved his beard and cut some of his hair off looking a whole new person. But when he reached Farah and Todd, watching Missy and Bobby arresting Dirk, he froze. “Got him!” said Missy, “sir you’re under arrest!”

Jon stepped back, weighing up his options.

“There must be some mistake!” said Todd.

“Stay where you are!” said Missy, “don’t make me chase you!”

Jon muttered to himself, his eyes wide with fear. Farah threw a look to Jon urging him to go. Todd did the opposite.

Jon audibly whispered, “I’m not going back,” and he took another step backwards. Missy took a step forward.

“Dammit please don’t run, I don’t get to carry a gun!” she shouted.

Jon frantically looked around, looking for an out like a panicked rat. He was going to have to run for it. It wouldn’t happen again. It wouldn’t-

Dirk popped his head out of the police car, “Jon don’t run! This is okay! Trust me, it’s all part of the plan!”

“Plan?” he almost whispered but loud enough to be heard.

“The universe’s plan, you know – interconnectedness! Just relax!” said Dirk, before Bobby urged him back in the car.

Jon flexed his arms. Then relented. He sighed deeply. Then thrust his arms out for Missy. She finally pulled out some handcuffs and latched them onto him.

“Oh thank god, you’ve no idea how much I’ve eaten, chasing you would’ve been a pain.”

*

“This is the plan?” asked Jon, sitting in the cell in the police station.

“Every investigation requires me getting arrested at least once,” said Dirk.

They were currently the only two in the holding cell, set just off from the main office where Todd and Farah were supposedly. There was a bench for them to sit on and outside was a table and chair where an officer was currently napping, the card key for the cell sitting in his belt. There was also a radio playing the latest hits which Dirk had attempted to get someone to change the channel, but Missy had refused saying, “prisoners don’t get radio rights! Well they might do but Karl here gets annoyed when I play Radio Four.”

Jon was looking dejected, slumped on the bench as Dirk paced around the room.

“I can’t believe I’ve been arrested. For squatting. Of all the things that I thought I’d be arrested for, this was not it,” said Jon.

“What did you expect to be arrested for?” asked Dirk.

“I’d rather not…” and Jon sighed, “look there’s a lot that I can’t talk about alright? My life has been rough.”

Dirk sympathised with the man. He sat down beside Jon on the bench and put a hand on his shoulder. He then tried to think of something to say but all that was coming up in his head were phrases from the book of small-talk. He didn’t think bringing up the weather was a good point of conversation, especially for the situation they were in. Instead he pondered for a moment on it.

“I’m sorry Jon,” he said, finally, taking responsibility for the fact they were both now locked in a jail cell in Edinburgh, “but this will be fine eventually. We’ll be out soon.”

“I’d hope so,” said Jon, not looking up.

Dirk pulled out the piece of paper from Billboard again, “you don’t happen to know any Russian do you?”

Jon sighed, “a little.”

“Can you read this?”

Dirk handed the paper to Jon who took it from him and let his eyes wander over it.

“…she’s been acting despondent and not working at full efficiency again today…” muttered Jon.

Dirk’s ears pricked up, “what was that?”

“It’s talking about an employee,” said Jon, “she’s not been working efficiently this week. They tried to give her some more challenging work but-“ and Jon paused, narrowing his eyes, before looking extremely cross. He thrust the paper back to Dirk.

“Are you alright?” asked Dirk, taking the paper back.

“I’m fine it’s just-“ and Jon put his hands to his head, “god dammit! This is ridiculous! This case was about someone who broke into my house, not all this fucking chatter about Billboard! They should be locked in here not me! Hey!” and Jon yelled out at the man napping, “let me out of here!”

The officer was roused and stretched his arms, “I wasn’t sleeping I was just…” and he wiped his eyes, “taking a rest? I don’t even know why I’m making excuses anymore.” He looked up at Jon who had his hands wrapped around the bars, “don’t cause trouble now.”

“I’m being held here against my will!”

“Of course you are, no criminal comes in willingly,” said the officer, “mostly. Anyway you were told, you’ve been charged with squatting. They’re looking at who can press charges when they find…” and the officer trailed off, “wait a second I know you.”

Jon froze the same way as he froze outside the hotel, his hands squeezing the bars. Dirk, who had been letting Jon go off the rails, stood up to join the conversation, “you know him?”

“Sure! He’s the two-time winner of Mastermind! Holy shit, Jon Carlyle right?” the officer said, hand on his knee, “what happened to you? Surely you’re sitting on millions right now, how’d you end up squatting?”

“Jon won Mastermind?” asked Dirk, “…that game show on answering questions?”

“Twice!” said the officer, “it was amazing. No one could believe it when he won the first time, then he blew it out the water the second time. Every general knowledge question, he was right on it.”

Jon sighed and sat back on the bench, “it was a long time ago,” he muttered.

“That is fascinating, so you’re a genius?” said Dirk.

“I’m not a genius, I’m just,” and he took a deep breath, “I just had all the answers I needed. I don’t have a degree, hell I didn’t really do well in school. I just kind of accumulate the information I need.”

“Like the slum-dog millionaire,” said Dirk.

Jon looked at Dirk, “I don’t really believe in such things as lessons, late-night courses, topic expertise and one-to-one tutoring. I see knowledge as being interwoven into the web of the whole. The knowledge we need and the knowledge we get are linked in often much more subtle and complex ways than we with our rough and ready understanding of the physical world might naturally suppose.

“To put it simply, my learning is much more concerned with the interconnectedness of all things.”

“The interconnectedness,” said Dirk, falling to his knees to Jon’s eye level, “you’re holistic.”

Jon looked up and met Dirk’s eyes.

“I see it,” continued Dirk, “I understand now. I get why you’re mysterious.”

“You do?”

“Does the word Blackwing mean anything to you?”

Jon didn’t answer but his eyes looked to dilate at the words, and his hair stood on end.

“I’m surprised we never met,” said Dirk, “they called me Icarus.”

Jon seemed to think it was some kind of joke, but nonetheless he perked up, “they didn’t let me talk to many people in case I learnt of a way to get out,” his eyes darted around, “Alexandria.”

“Like the library!”

“Yep.”

“I’m guessing they found you after Mastermind,” said Dirk.

“And I was locked up for a good eight years,” said Jon, “until they shut it down. I just couldn’t get them to understand it wasn’t something I could turn on, it was just a feeling.”

“I was exactly the same,” said Dirk.

Jon chuckled, “for a bunch of guys with a whole facility, they were pretty dumb.”

Dirk laughed at this too, “it was pretty awful.”

“Yeah well,” said Jon, “since then I’ve been staying away from the spotlight.”

“I’m gonna catch a couple more winks so you guys keep it calm now,” said the officer, “I often don’t get a chance like this.”

Unfortunately for him he didn’t get much time to rest when the door was wrenched from its hinges.

*

“Hi Ms Black, thanks for the job! Just letting you know Alice let me in and I’m looking at the hardware now,” Lewis’ voice came through the phone, “this old tech is just the kind of thing I love! Retro PCs are the rage! They’re worth a lot you know? You could probably sell it for a lot.”

“That’s great, you think you can fix it?” asked Farah. She was sat at the back of a room in the police station where their desks were situated. Todd was being talked to by the officers, and she was waiting her turn.

“Oh for sure, it shouldn’t take me long. This computer looks to have just been burnt out by an electrical discharge. Easy peasy! Lemons and all!”

“Great, let me know as soon as it boots,” said Farah.

“Absolutely! I’ll be sure to give a bill by the end, but for now I’m loving this old stuff. This Alice girl is cute too, is she single?”

Farah sighed, “I don’t know, I only met her today.”

“I think I’ll ask her out.”

“Sure, go for it.”

“You think she’ll say yes?”

“I honestly don’t know. Is this-“

“Do you think she likes coffee? Or do you think she’s classy. She seems smart. Ah I’ll just go for it, anyway, I’ll get back to you how it goes! Thanks again!”

*

Todd felt a little on edge to be sat next to a police desk. They always seemed to end up at the police one way or another. He supposed it was to be expected – any kind of investigation, criminal or not, would have to perk police interest eventually. Unfortunately they were here for reasons completely separate to the case at hand.

Before him was officer Bobby as he had introduced himself, the main person on the case of the stolen car, who’d also decided to pursue Jon for squatting and possible drug deals. Bobby was young and fresh-faced, bald, and the look of someone who might often lose their train of thought. It had already happened twice when Todd was spelling out his last name.

“So you’re investigating a BAE for this Jon,” said Bobby aloud, “why did he hire you guys? Aren’t you American?”

Todd shrugged, “Dirk said he’d asked for us specifically, we just went with it.”

“Okay,” said Bobby, typing this up on his computer, then considering it, “…what did you say after ‘he asked for your specifically’?”

“…We just went with it?”

“Thanks.”

Bobby leant back a bit, “I’m just having someone look into the records for that bookshop. We need to track down its owner to be able to press any charges, if they want to,” said Bobby, “it looked like that powder was just flour on the floor though so we will be dropping the drug charges. We thought the ivy might have been cannabis but looks like the place is just old.” He tapped a pen on the table, “so do you have any leads on who broke into the bookshop after Jon then?”

Todd looked around awkwardly, “not exactly but we’ll get there. We have a way of doing things.”

Bobby put a pen to his lips, “I did see someone shady around there. I wonder if they were involved.”

Todd pushed on that, “what did they look like?”

Bobby laughed, “funny, they hid themselves in a lot of clothes. That’s why I thought they were shady.”

Another officer entered the room and sat at the desk nearby, jabbing at the computer, “hey Bobby, we had another alert from the hospital.”

Bobby leaned over, “how many is that?”

“Five now,” said the officer, “another from Livingston. They’re starting to think it’s the beginning of some pandemic. They’re still working on the bloodwork.”

Todd switched to the new topic, “what’s that about?”

Bobby sighed, “eh, we’re got a few cases of spontaneous narcolepsy being reported in Livingston,” said Bobby shrugging, “don’t know what it’s about but people keep just falling asleep. It might start becoming an issue if they fall asleep in their cars but it’s all been safe so far. We’re just preparing if we need to put a state of emergency out,” he thought for a few seconds longer than a moment, “I’m not telling you to promote panic of course. If you’re from out of the country I doubt you’re at risk.”

Todd looked behind him to see Farah talking on her phone on a chair at the back of the room. Seeing him she waved at him and smiled. He smiled back. He wished he hadn’t been picked first to talk to. He wasn’t great under pressure like this.

“What’s going to happen to Dirk?” asked Todd.

“Hm? Oh he’s probably going to have to go on trial at some point,” said Bobby, “we’ve got him having possession of the car and the transaction involved. You guys looks like you’re innocent but the affiliation isn’t great. We might have to write it up on your record. Or something. I’m not sure,” and he sighed, “I think the guys upstairs mainly just care about Dirk. They don’t sound fond of the guy.”

“They know Dirk?”

“He’s got a record it seems. Before he was in the US he was here a while. Mainly in London. But he made an impact, there’s quite a few files he was involved with,” explained Bobby, “something about a sofa at one point. I didn’t have access to them, this is just what I heard from the guys. He’s not a fugitive but definitely a ‘menace to the peace’.”

“That sounds like Dirk,” said Todd, causing Bobby to laugh.

“You guys seem alright, sorry about this but you know. Law and order. It’s a thin blue line,” said Bobby.

Missy, the officer who’d help arrest them reappeared. She was wide-berthed, with a hair in a ponytail, and a crooked smile. Her eyes were almost half-closed, as if she were just dropping off to sleep, or she’d forgotten her glasses.

“Bobby, I got the deets!” she called, handing a piece of paper to Bobby.

Bobby took it from her and looked it over, “huh, Henry Miller eh? Let’s give him a ring then.”

Todd suddenly sat up straight, “Henry Miller? Did you say Henry Miller?”

“Yup, you know him?” said Bobby.

Todd’s mind clicked together and he looked back at Farah again. He waved her over, excitedly.

“Woah hey, I’m not done with just you yet,” said Bobby but Farah was already at the desk.

“Henry Miller owned the bookshop!” cried Todd, “it’s connected!”

“What are you serious?” said Farah.

“Yes, but go sit back down, we’re still conducting the interview,” said Bobby.

Ignoring him, Todd continued, “you think that maybe the attacker was Henry Miller himself? Returning to take back his bookshop?”

“Why would a guy turn up twenty years later? And why would he want that place back?”

“I don’t know but there’s a link there! Maybe he wants the tape, maybe it’s HIS tape?” said Todd, “it’s connected though and that’s what matters.”

Bobby held his hand out, “stop wait, what are you guys discussing? What do you mean it’s connected?”

“Not your case, to ours,” said Todd, “it could be right?”

“Cool, well let’s just go find him and ask him right?” Farah said sarcastically, “that’s going to be the only way to check right, seeing as he’s been gone twenty years.”

“Maybe Dirk was right in that we have to use Jon as bait and wait for him to turn up,” said Todd, “after we get him out of here of course, there’s no way the guy will turn up at the police station.”

And like the universe was following their twitch stream, waiting for the perfect moment to throw a spanner into the works, the doors to the room opened with a bang.

Everyone looked to the new entrée, a man covered in clothes: face mask, goggles, hood, gloves, boots. Their steps were heavy and slow, thudding on the floorboards. The officers in the room were at attention.

“Woah hey, you can’t come in here,” called the officer that was sat next to Bobby.

“That’s the guy,” whispered Bobby, “the shady one near the bookshop.”

“The clothed man,” said Missy.

The clothed man continued walking, but then their voice boomed. It sounded as if it was being projected from a Bluetooth speaker or a phone, “where is Jonathan Carlyle?”

“Sir, please leave or we’ll be forced to put you under arrest,” said the other officer, standing up and reaching for their belt.

“Where is Jonathan Carlyle?” repeated the clothed man, their steps not wavering in their rhythm.

Farah leant over to Todd, “Todd, you know how I asked how dangerous this investigation was going to be?”

The officer moved forward to approach the clothed man, “step back sir! You’re not allowed to-“

Before they could utter another word, the clothed man grabbed the officer by the shoulders and lifted them off the floor an inch. Everyone went silent. And then the officer was flung to the other side of the room, bouncing off a desk and landing on the ground.

“Yep looks like it’s been booted up to a ten,” said Todd, standing up.

“Missy, get the civilians out to safety!” ordered Bobby, to which Missy gestured for Todd and Farah to follow.

“Where is Jonathan Carlyle!?” shouted the clothed man, his voice booming louder and yet compressed.

“Sir, stand down!” shouted Bobby, pulling out a taser, “someone get the ARU out here!”

Another officer raced out the room to make the phone call. The clothed man marched to the door to the holding cells, reaching for the handle. Bobby watched him as he did so and tried to evaluate what the next option was. One thousand, two thousand, three elephants – wait.

The clothed man grabbed the handle and tried to open the door but found it was locked. Their grip increased and their fingers reached between the hinge and the frame. With a swift yank, the door was wrenched from its hinges and he dropped it to the ground.

The officer inside who was about to try and nap jumped to their feet, “woah! Hold on, stop right there!”

The clothed man had Jon in his sights. The clothed man stepped forward, and the officer stepped backward to work out what to do.

“Jonathan Carlyle,” boomed the clothed man.

Dirk was at attention, standing back. Jon also was standing at the ready, his eyes wide.

“It’s him!” he said, “the guy who broke into my bookshop!”

“That’s him!?” said Dirk, “he just pulled a door from its hinges!”

“Not surprising since he ripped out my window frame,” said Jon flatly.

“Where is Ava?” asked the clothed man.

Jon didn’t answer. Dirk also didn’t say anything. The silence was deafening.

“Where is Ava?” repeated the clothed man.

“She’s not here,” said Jon.

“I need Ava,” said the clothed man, approaching the bars.

Just before he reached them, Bobby had appeared behind him. The taser found its way forced into the clothed man’s back. He let loose the discharge.

The clothed man was unaffected.

Bobby stepped back incredulous, “what the-“

He didn’t finish the thought as the clothed man swung at him. But he was slow enough that Bobby could duck yet fell to the ground. The clothed man lifted his leg and attempted to stamp down on Bobby but his foot drove onto the bare ground with a heavy thud. Bobby had crawled back quickly, reaching the door frame to pull himself up.

“Everyone out!” shouted Bobby.

The officer with the card key fumbled, but the clothed man noticed this. He approached him, hand outstretched to accept the card. The officer couldn’t tell whether it was a good idea or not.

“Don’t give him the key!” shouted Dirk, “we’re pretty safe in here!”

The officer agreed and instead backed away towards the door at the other side of the room. He eventually made a run for it before the clothed man could react, but the clothed man didn’t seem deterred. He dropped his arm and turned to the holding cell. Then he grabbed the bars and his hands gripped them tightly. His elbows lifted, and they watched as the clothed man attempted to pry them apart.

They budged. Slightly.

“Okay we need to get out of here!” shouted Dirk, “sir a little help!?”

Bobby got back to his feet and pulled out his baton. If electricity didn’t work then a good whack to the head would. He swung with all his might at the clothed man’s head.

The baton made contact but the clothed man yet again was unaffected. They instead paused in their attempt to pry the bars open and turned to Bobby.

“Aw crap,” said Bobby, “one, two, three…” he muttered to himself, “Jesus!”

The clothed man picked up the pace and marched to Bobby and took yet another swing, but Bobby yet again avoided it. The police training really had to kick into gear – never had they ever had to face such an attacker in the station, impervious to every weapon in their armoury. This was unheard of.

He stepped back into the main office area and ducked behind a table. The clothed man was unperturbed; they grabbed the edge of it and threw it up into the air, having it tumble over Bobby’s head. The table crashed into the one next to it, the computer on top crashing to the floor and opening up, papers fluttering into the air.

Meanwhile Dirk was at Jon’s side, “Jon you have to have something to get us out of here.”

Jon was thinking deeply, trying to pry something out of his head. He had something but he was having difficulty pulling it out. He dug deep, rooting around. Small-talk, Russian, weather patterns in Sicily, the winning score for the 2007 football championship, the ingredients for a custard cream, and-

He took a look at the jail cell door. It was electronically powered and slid open when unlocked. The block for the magnetic lock was screwed in. Dirk followed him to it.

“If I could get this open,” thought Jon out loud.

“Let me try,” said Dirk, and he poked at it with his fingers. And without much prodding, he pulled the panel off with no effort, “huh, looked like it was loose.”

“Thanks,” said Jon, now considering the wires. And this was his moment as he knew exactly which wires went where and what they did. He pulled one out, connected it somewhere else, and then uttered, “push it open.”

Dirk obliged and the cell door slid away, just as they heard another crash. The two of them looked to see if they were in the clothed man’s sight, but as he was hard at work dealing with Bobby they had their chance. Jon made a run for the door. But Dirk hesitated.

“We’ve got to get out of here!” whispered Jon loudly.

“But we’ve got to help the policeman!” replied Dirk, “we’ve got to do something right?”

“Against that thing!? I’m not risking my life,” replied Jon, going for the door.

Dirk frantically looked at the door and to the office. “Sorry,” he stated. Then bolted to the office.

He found the clothed man standing over Bobby, baton now in his hand. Bobby didn’t look like he was out for the count but he was aware that this was probably not going to end in him walking away. Until Dirk shouted, “OVER HERE! WE’RE ESCAPING!” And Dirk turned to Jon, “run!”

Jongave a dark and angry look, but the two of them raced out the other door. The clothed man stopped his tirade, uttered a strained yell, threw the baton to the floor and went after Dirk and Jon, walking fast paced. Bobby noticed the change in direction and saw his chance. He knew that physical attacks didn’t work, electrical attacks didn’t work. The clothed man was an unstoppable force, but there had to be some weakness. The baton was by him now and in reach.

Even though it didn’t work last time he had little choice. Bobby gripped it, got up to his feet and took another swing. But this time he went for the legs. He went for the back of the knee. He swung with all his might. He had only one shot.

The swing landed, and for some reason, this did it. The clothed man dropped to his knee. He thudded down, almost losing his balance. Something cracked, but when Bobby looked at the baton he found it was the wood that had split. That was one hell of a hit.

The clothed man turned around and reached his hand toward Bobby. “What did you do!?” he cried. Bobby was stunned. He was horrified. He pushed through it and threw the baton at the clothed man and it thudded off his head, bouncing away. Then he ran. He ran around the overturned tables to follow Jon and Dirk. He ignored the fact that the clothed man’s glove had ripped. He ignored the fact that he hadn’t seen flesh and bone. He ignored the fact that instead of a human hand, he’d seen thin metallic fingers attached to mechanical knuckles. He tried to think of elephants.

Catching up to Dirk and Jon, he shouted, “the car park! Get to the cars!”

They burst out doors into hallways and found themselves outside in the patrol car car-park. Bobby reached into his pockets for the car keys he had – he pressed the button to unlock one. The lights flashed on one of the cars and Dirk and Jon aimed for it. Jon almost flopped into the backseats and Dirk got in the passenger side. Bobby rounded the other side, definitely injured, struggling to pull the car door open and get in. By the time they were in the car, the clothed man was at the station’s door. The engine started and the clothed man limped toward them.

“Drive, drive!” yelled Dirk.

“I’m getting there!” shouted Bobby, and reversed as fast as he could toward the gates.

Shit. The gates the were shut. Fuck it.

Bobby swung the car around, the clothed man reaching their car’s bumper. He grabbed ahold, and as Bobby hit the pedal to the floor, the bumper was torn off in the clothed man’s hands. They aimed for the gate. Dirk held his arms up to protect his face. And then they hit it.

The gate was luckily flimsy enough to be thrown to the side, yet it caused the car to lurch as the right-hand side of the bonnet crumpled, but it continued to move. The tyre’s rubber burned on the asphalt, and they hit the road going way beyond the speed limit.

“What the hell, what the hell!” shouted Bobby, “what the hell did I see!?”

“This is crazy, this is THE worst case!” shouted Dirk.

“Is he following us!?” shouted Bobby.

Jon was looking out the rear view, “no he was injured. He’s gone.”

“Fuck me, fuck, fuck!” shouted Bobby, “one thousand, two elephants, FUCK! What was that!? What is going on, who are you guys!? Why did that guy have a robotic hand!? And why did he want you!? Who’s Ava!? And goddammit why didn’t I listen to the upstairs, fuck they said, they said you’d get us in danger!” he whacked the steering wheel with his hand, “what have you gotten me into! What did you get me into!?”


	5. Red Hands

_Henry Miller was at his desk, his head in hands, tears running down his wrists and forearms. He was alone in his study. The papers in front of him were scribbled notes and typed up reports of his research. But foremost was the police enquiry. It had tear stains on it. He ignored this._

_He couldn’t control his feelings. The guilt was overwhelming. He had no comfort, no one to turn to. The public would think him a monster. He was alone. He was alone just like-_

_No, he couldn’t take it. He lifted the spider-like dead-piece on top of his bald head and booted up the PC sat next to him. He didn’t check the network connection, even though it blinked to say it was live. He wasn’t expecting it, but he also didn’t care. He wanted it to be over. He wanted everything to be done with. He couldn’t deal with it anymore._

_He launched the software and it began. Lines of digits were written to the computer’s console screen. He held the helmet down on his head. He clenched his eyes shut. He whispered to himself, “I’m sorry Ava.”_

_The metallic pads on the helmets three legs got warmer. And warmer. They were burning hot, steam lifting from them, burning against his skin. Henry seethed at the pain, but he knew it would pale into comparison. Because then the sparks appeared, flickering over the pads. They increased in size, arcing over the whole helmet from one side to another. The digits continued streaming along the console, pages and pages of them._

_Henry was unaware that they were being sent over the network. He didn’t care. Because he was screaming. He was screaming so loud. The electricity was pulsing through the helmet now, it was no longer bothered with the air. It had his head now. They coursed through his brain. They tickled and locked into his nerve endings. Every brain cell was being charred by the volts._

_He continued screaming. But he held the helmet onto his head. He deserved this._

_*_

“We’re going to go to my girlfriend’s place,” said Bobby, “it’ll be the safest place right now.”

Jon and Dirk were in the back of the police car.

“I’m sorry you’re involved,” said Dirk, “things do often get out of hand. Are you badly hurt?”

“My hand isn’t too great,” replied Bobby, “yeah I just wanted to arrest you for car theft, how did that mean I get attacked by a robot?”

“It’s my fault, I’ve put you in danger. He wants me,” said Jon.

“He said he wanted Ava,” corrected Dirk, “who is Ava?”

Dirk held onto the fact that he knew about the tape; he couldn’t ruin the trust that he and Jon had developed so far. He needed Jon to trust to reveal more of what he knew. Which seemed to be a lot.

Jon looked out the window. It had gotten dark now. The lights of the city were gone, they were in the country now. He couldn’t see a thing. It was strange to be in a box of light surrounded by darkness. It was exactly how he felt – in a small parcel of light travelling through a realm of darkness, unsure what was around him except for what was directly in front of him. And the road signs would pass him and impart their wisdom, but he wouldn’t be able to use it until he could see the bend right in front of him, or the junctions appearing at the last second. Swinging blindly in the dark until he accidentally hit the light switch and it became clear.

It was maddening. He wanted to not drive in the dark for once. Why couldn’t he be like the normal people, walking in the dark with nothing to aid them. Arms flailing wildly, stumbling through, sometimes hitting their goal and sometimes not. They were lucky.

“She was my wife,” he finally said, and he sat back to look at Dirk for his reaction.

“Oh.”

“Oh?”

“Sorry, I didn’t know what to say afterwards. The way you said it, it sounded like she wasn’t anymore,” said Dirk.

“She isn’t,” sighed Jon and he looked at his hands. They were shaking. “She died.”

Dirk didn’t say anything this time, learning his lesson. Instead he put a hand on Jon’s shoulder.

“I’m sorry.”

“She died while I was in Blackwing,” continued Jon, “I only found out when I escaped. And not immediately either, it took time to find out. There was nothing I could do.

“You know she thought I vanished off the face of the earth? They didn’t tell anyone where I went, they kept it secret. As if I’d blinked from existence. How do you think she felt, not knowing where her husband went all that time?”

“I can’t imagine,” said Dirk.

Dirk didn’t say anything else, and Jon didn’t continue.

“She probably knew you were out there somewhere,” spoke up Bobby, who had been listening too, “she probably never gave up hope.”

“I don’t know whether that’s worse than thinking I was dead,” said Jon.

Dirk felt his phone vibrate and had to awkwardly show he wasn’t just reaching down his trousers as he pulled it out to answer. On the other end was Todd, his voice was high and frantic as it got when he was scared and excited at the same time. Dirk tried to calm him down as he admitted that ‘yes he was alive’ and ‘yes he was with Jon’.

“Where are you?” asked Todd.

“We’re with Bobby, the officer, he’s driving us to his girlfriend’s where he said it’d be safe for now until the armed response unit is involved,” explained Dirk, “what about you?”

“We’re with Missy the other officer,” replied Todd, “listen there’s a link between Jon and Henry Miller, the professor at the zoo who had disappeared. Henry used to own the bookshop that Jon was living in. I think it might be Henry Miller who is after Jon.”

“Well we’ve learnt that the clothed man, as we’ve taken to calling him (they had an argument on whether the name was a good name) anyway, he’s a robot. Or at least has a robotic hand,” said Dirk.

“That would fit! If Henry disappeared, perhaps he became a robot!” In Todd’s car, Farah gave him a look, to which Todd covered his phone to say, “is that really hard to believe?”

“It’s a good idea but he was asking for Ava, Jon’s wife.”

“Jon has a wife? (Dirk explained the case of Jon’s wife) Oh sorry. Yeah okay we don’t have anything on her. But, Farah spoked to the guy who’s fixing Henry’s old computer before we left the police station. I think, and Farah agrees; we should check on the computer and see what it has. Maybe it has the link between Ava and Henry!”

“Okay good plan,” said Dirk, “I’ll stay with Jon then. Keep me in the loop.”

They hung up and Dirk told Jon and Bobby that his compatriots were going for a field trip to the zoo.

“Missy will keep them safe,” said Bobby, then shook his head immediately after, “sorry that’s a lie. She’s a special constable, she’s not a fully-fledged office of the law. She’s nice though if that’s any consolation.”

“It is a little,” said Dirk.

“Alright we’re arriving now, I’ll park up. She lives up above the coffee shop,” said Bobby.

“Coffee shop?” asked Dirk, a piece dropping from his head from a memory, and when he looked out the window in the streetlights and read the words ‘The Botanist’ he then said, “oh no.”

*

Todd finished up in his call and leaned out form the backseat to talk to Missy and Farah. Missy was at the wheel, driving with a look in her eyes that Farah recognised as fear.

“Are you alright?” Farah asked her.

“M hm! This is exciting you know? This is like, Terminator, you know when he just fucks up a bunch of cops in the police station? Like the original Terminator, yeah. Arnold isn’t gonna get us!” she said.

“It’s alright if you’re not,” said Farah, “this is a lot.”

“Oh yeah, no I’m fine,” Missy said, “I guess I always hoped I’d be involved in some film plot so this is exactly what I wanted right? At least it isn’t Terminator 3 or we’d all die in the end, right?” she hummed on a note.

“We need to go to Edinburgh zoo,” said Farah, “we’ve got to check on something.”

“Oh sure! Yeah, huh okay, sure,” and she pulled over. Farah and Todd looked at her. Missy was fighting tears. She saw them looking at her and then wiped them away, “sorry I just need a minute. This was a lot, that was scary back there. You think everyone’s alright?”

“Maybe,” said Todd.

“Bobby said things might get dangerous around the Dirk guy. I thought he meant like we’d get into the danger because he’d take us down some rabbit hole. I didn’t expect it to just pop up and find us. I wasn’t prepared.”

“Yeah that’s how it goes. We can take a minute if you need it,” said Farah.

Missy nodded, “man I’m just a special constable. I don’t get to hold any arms you know? Like if people need protection I’m definitely not the person, I just,” she sniffed, “I just wanted to be involved somehow.”

“We’ve got Farah,” said Todd, “you haven’t seen it but Farah’s got skills. She’s protect us.”

“I sure wish I had some guns to do it though,” said Farah, “I can do hand to hand combat sure, but never bring a knife to a gun fight.”

Missy laughed, “you guys are really positive. How can you be so positive after all that?”

Todd lifted his hands in a shrug, “the universe has always looked after us. It’ll be okay in the end.”

Missy nodded. She wiped her nose on her sleeve.

“Okay let’s hope I don’t get you guys killed then,” she coughed, “okay Edinburgh zoo then?”

“Yeah, I’ll give Lewis a ring,” said Farah and pulled out her phone as Missy pulled off again. Todd leaned forward to hear the conversation. “Lewis? We’re coming to the zoo, okay?” she finally said when the phone connected.

“Oh, sure! Sounds great, yeah I got the computer working, so great!” said Lewis.

“We’ll be there in ten minutes,” said Farah.

“Ten minutes? Oh yeah I’ll be here, don’t worry! Can’t wait,” said Lewis.

“Alright, cool,” Farah hung up with a look of concern on her face. She turned to Todd. “He sounded off just then. Something didn’t seem right.”

“What didn’t sound right?”

“He wasn’t as talkative as he usually was. Do you think he found something?”

*

Lewis hadn’t found something, he’d been found. He put down the phone next to the computer as his boss walked round to the other side of the desk, where Alice was sitting.

“Great work Lewis, you may make yourself useful just yet,” said his boss.

She was Jonquil; a woman in her late forties, her hair tied into a ponytail, sharp cheekbones yet large bright eyes. Her hair was dirty blonde, and when she let her hair down the guys would swoon. Lewis had noticed this when he first met her. He had wondered if she’d go out with him at the time. Now he no longer felt that way, he just felt scared. Well, scared and aroused. Scaroused.

Jonquil put her hands on Alice’s shoulders, who shuddered at the touch. Alice had been roped to the chair and gagged, to take precautions. She also was scared, but far more than Lewis. Lewis knew what was going on, Alice didn’t.

“Good, good,” said Lewis, “yeah I knew this would happen. This was totally my plan.”

“Really?” Jonquil raised an eyebrow, “it wasn’t because you got bored? I admit Lewis, when I assigned you to stick around Livingston, it wasn’t tactical really. I didn’t think Jon would EVER return. And yet now you’ve managed to find the other computer. It’s like fate. A weird kind of fate,” she took a break and took a sip of water from the water bottle in her belt and did a few jogs in place. “Eurgh I think my step rate is still too low. Shy of thirty thousand. I hope this little mission kicks it up,” she said.

Jonquil then circled round again to the computer screen. One of Jonquil’s men, dressed in black and holding a machine gun, entered the room.

“The building’s empty ma’am. Everyone went home for the day,” he reported.

The other man on the other side of the room was playing with the bird cage, of which a parrot was sleeping on his perch. Alice watched him; for some reason she was worried more about Peter than herself. Perhaps it was a way of distracting herself from the fact she probably wasn’t going to survive this.

“Good news,” said Jonquil, “so its just your girlfriend here Lewis.” Jonquil stood upright and unholstered her gun, “so is she any use to us?”

Lewis looked up from the keyboard and looked into Alice’s terrified eyes. She was pleading with him voicelessly. She tried to talk but the wad of material in her mouth muffled her. Lewis bit his lip.

“Yeah, yeah she’s the only one who can work the computer,” said Lewis, “she worked with Henry at the time.”

Jonquil tilted her head, “okay,” she pointed orders for one of the men to ungag Alice. After they did Alice spluttered and began talking rapidly.

“Please don’t kill me, please,” she repeated.

“It’s okay honey, how about you tell us how to work the computer huh? Actually no, can you tell us what it does first?” asked Jonquil.

Alice looked up at Jonquil and then at Lewis. Lewis realised his mistake. Alice began stuttering as she tried to get the words out.

“It’s a b-brain scanner! It records b-brain activity and records it,” she said quickly.

“Records it where, where does it go?” asked Jonquil.

Alice flicked her eyes around the room and to Lewis. Lewis shook his head softly.

“I-I-“ she stuttered, “I don’t know.”

Jonquil smiled sweetly, and then holstered her gun. “See Lewis, this is why you were stationed here! Because I like you, you’re a good guy, but then there lies the problem. You’re a good guy. You don’t recognise that when things need to stay secret, they NEED to stay secret,” she looked at Alice, “and people are much better at keeping secrets when they’re dead.”

She nodded to one of the men. The unholstered their gun, pressed it to Alice’s temple and fired.

Lewis was stunned but he didn’t show it. He watched Alice’s life drain from her head onto the floor.

“Good work Wung,” said Jonquil, “see Wung knew exactly what needed to be done.”

Peter was awake. He’d woken up to the sound of the gunshot. He was flapping wildly around his cage, shouting ‘I hope this works!’ over and over.

Jonquil took another swig of water and then pointed at the cage, “shut that bird up! It’s driving me insane. I can’t think with this chatter.”

The man lifted the cage and tossed it to the ground. Then he stomped on the grating a couple of times, breaking the small bars and crushing Peter, who’d be stunned, under his boot. It made a crunch that caused Lewis to wince.

“Alright, let’s get this computer out of here,” said Jonquil, “come on Lewis. I’ve got more in store for you.”

Lewis stood up slowly from his seat, his legs wanting to give way and drop him to the ground. But his training wouldn’t let him. He tried picturing Alice before now and how she looked. The hair, the outfit. She liked giraffes. He was going to get her a stuffed giraffe. He wondered if he should still get one.

“Lewis! Hup to! Said Jonquil, snapping him out of it, “Wung, Abed; you know what to do.”

He unplugged the computer and picked up the helmet. Wung and Abed, the two men, untied Alice as Abed put a gun into Alice’s hand and began arranging the scene to make it believable. Lewis didn’t look back. He followed Jonquil out of the office.

*

By the time Farah, Todd and Missy had arrived, there was no indication that Jonquil or her men had been there. The university building was quiet and dark. Farah and Todd lead the way to Alice’s office where the computer had been placed.

“Lewis?” called out Farah, worried that it was dark.

When there was no answer they entered Alice’s office. The found Alice’s body, sitting at her desk, a gun in her hand. The birdcage was still on the floor, Peter’s crumpled form inside. Farah and Todd were shocked. Missy who had come from behind saw Alice and had to turn away, gagging.

“Jesus!” she said, “what the hell!? What happened here?”

“The computer’s gone,” said Todd, trying not to look at Alice.

Farah did, she looked at her sadly. She didn’t touch her, she just knelt down beside her to look her over. In the back of her mind was the nagging of guilt; Alice had no part to play in all of this. She was just an innocent bystander. Killed by – killed by someone.

“Did she kill herself?” asked Missy.

“They wanted it to look that way,” said Farah, “but there’s no way. The computer’s gone and so is Lewis. They must’ve have taken them.”

“Who? The clothed man?” suggested Todd.

“There’s no way he got here before us after leaving the station,” said Farah, “there must be something else in play.”

Todd took a look at the birdcage, seeing Peter’s dead body. He bent lower to look at his crushed form. Then he waved for Farah to come over. When she did, he lifted the cage up, opened it, and reached in.

“Ew, don’t pick it up Todd,” said Farah.

“Just look,” he said, and he lifted out Peter’s lifeless body.

There wasn’t any blood or guts. The thing had crumpled, but when he lifted up its wing he found underneath was a set of thing metal rods instead of bones. The parrot’s eye was cracked, made of plastic.

“I think it’s a robot,” said Todd, “like the clothed man.”

Missy was on the phone, calling in the fact there was a body at the zoo. When she finished she told Farah and Todd that, “the paramedics are on their way, as well as a few officers. They’re still cleaning up the station, everything’s on high alert.”

Missy was staring at Alice as she said this, rather than looking at Todd and Farah.

“Is this your first time seeing a body?” asked Farah.

“Heh, yeah,” said Missy, “I always thought it’d be cool,” her smile dropped, “but it’s just sad. And scary. Is that how we all look when we die you think?”

She slumped down the wall to sit with her knees at her chin.

“This is a lot for me,” she muttered sadly.

“That’s alright,” said Todd, who had joined her on the floor, “I don’t think we’ll ever get used to this?”

“You’ve seen dead people before?”

Todd realised he’d put his foot in it, “being around Dirk has never been safe. We’ve had a few close shaves.”

“And this is normal?”

“It’s never normal,” said Todd, and he finally looked up at Alice.

He’d seen a lot of dead people. More than the average person. He never thought of it as normal. The thing was, the shock of seeing a dead person diminished over time. You got used to seeing corpses, the frigid bodies, blood or not. Like a sleeping person.

The thing that hit hard every time was considering the fact, over and over, that they were dead. That this person who was full of life and energy, was no more. And never would again. Who they were had ceased to exist and what effect would that have on the world.

Most importantly, was it his fault? Could he have known this would happen?

“Let’s get something to eat,” he finally said, standing up.

Missy nodded and slowly stood up to follow.

“I’ll give you a lift to your hotel after someone takes over,” she said, “then I’m going home.”

*

“Alright you guys can take the sofa and the floor, we have some duvets around here,” said Bobby.

They were in the apartment above the Botanist now. A back door had lead to the stairs that took them to the next floor. They had an open plan lounge and kitchen, and a short hallway to the bedroom and bathroom. Bobby left Jon and Dirk to the lounge to retrieve some sleeping arrangements.

Jon went to the kitchen and helped himself to a glass off the draining board and filled a glass of water. He drank it steadily until it was empty.

Dirk awkwardly checked out the apartment, checking the photos on the wall. He recognised the woman – the barista. She was stood with Bobby on a beach. They were smiling at the camera, in an embrace. Dirk smiled at it, feeling the warmth.

“So Jon,” asked Dirk, “if you don’t mind me asking, what would Ava have to do with this?”

Jon sighed, “she worked for Billboard,” he admitted.

Dirk’s head made a connection, “so when they called you in, it was to fix her stuff right?”

Jon nodded without saying anything.

“When did she die?” asked Dirk.

“About twenty years ago I heard,” said Jon.

Bobby had returned with bedding, dropping into the conversation.

“Hold on, twenty years ago? The same time frame as Henry Miller’s disappearance,” said Dirk, “there’s another link. Perhaps they suffered a similar fate. How did she die?”

Jon shook his head, “they couldn’t tell me. Locked up in secrecy,” said Jon.

“Didn’t you get to see her body?”

“I wasn’t there.”

Dirk pressed his lips shut; yes he should’ve know that.

“Twenty years ago huh?” said Bobby, who had dropped the bedding onto the sofa, holding onto the backboard, as if holding him steady, “that’s curious.”

“Yeah two people meeting tragic ends around the same time,” said Dirk.

“Three,” uttered Bobby.

Dirk had to swing his head to Bobby, “three?”

Bobby squeezed the sofa backboard cushions, not looking up. He lifted his head up slowly and the look on his face was one of dredged up memories, “this might not be related, but,” and he took a moment to figure out how to say it, “my father disappeared twenty years ago.”

The room entered a silence. A deep silence that nobody wanted to disturb. Dirk’s head was in agony, he’d already got so many loose ends and now another one had been shoved in, like eating one marshmallow too many. And all he could think was ‘one was an anomaly, two was a coincidence…’

“But three’s a pattern.”

*

Lewis was strapped into a chair in just a normal room, the computer set-up beside him and the scanner’s head-piece on his head, the plates touching his forehead and the back of his neck. His eyes flittered around the room, waiting. They’d left him there after strapping him in. It’d be fine! This would be fine.

They were back at headquarters. It’d had been a while since he’d been back in here, they hadn’t needed to pull him in for check-ups. And he didn’t really want to come back, it was just your usual security firm. So much paperwork, so many guns. He liked doing informant work, that stuff was easy.

Lewis wondered how this was going to affect his end of year performance. Sure, he hadn’t been doing too well, but he thought he’d be fine in Livingston. A dead-end assignment, letting him just chill until they found the guy. Until they found Jon. Never mind, he supposed, they’d found what they needed even more. It was a shame he couldn’t go back to his undercover life. He liked fixing VCRs. He met a lot of interesting and elderly people who needed VCRs fixed. They had led very interesting lives and recorded so many important moments on their VHS tapes.

He wished he had the same record of an interesting fulfilling life. All he had was bad work reports and failures in missions. And now he was strapped to a chair, with a doo-hickey on his head.

“Hello? Jonquil? Are we gonna start the experiment soon?” he called out.

It was a long time before she showed up again. She was alone. She took a swig of water.

“Hi Lewis, how are you feeling?” she asked.

“Tired,” said Lewis, “so are we doing this? Can we get this over with?”

“Do you know what this thing does?” asked Jonquil.

Lewis shook his head, “when I was fixing it, it looked like a scanner.”

“Ah yes, but it’s a special scanner Lewis! Luckily, we have the other computer, the one it’s connected to, we’ve had it for a while. It’s been a dead weight though, no matter what we couldn’t replicate what exactly this computer did. But now we have the scanner, its all made sense,” Jonquil circled to the computer, “we’ve just had to make sure its set up correctly and they’re communicating.”

“Great,” said Lewis, “what’s it communicating?”

“Oh you’ll find out,” said Jonquil.

“Are the straps necessary?” he asked, “I’m kind of willing.”

“For now,” said Jonquil, “sorry Lewis, this may hurt a bit. But it’ll be worth it.”

She tapped a few keys and hit enter to start processing the software. The program began to run and digits streamed onto the display, lines processing down and down. The console screen filled up entirely and it kept going and going.

Lewis didn’t feel anything. He felt pretty at peace. Until Jonquil headed for the door.

“I’ll see you in a couple of hours, it’s a long process,” she said.

“Okay, but can I at least have some company?” he asked.

Jonquil smiled sweetly, “sorry Lewis,” and she knelt down, “after a while company won’t help. But I’ll see you on the other side, hopefully. You’ve still got a job to do!”

Lewis looked up puzzled, “a job? You mean Jon?”

“We still need that tape,” said Jonquil, “so we still need Jon. You’ll be reassigned when the experiment’s done.” She stood up and just before she left added, ”this might hurt a bit.”

The door clicked behind her. Lewis tapped his feet. Yeah he’d better buy like a camcorder after this. He could start recording his life from this point on. Maybe he could go into vlogging? People love watching people film they’re lives. Yeah as soon as-

His fingers twitched as he felt his head beginning to warm. The plates were growing hotter.

“Ma’am?” he called out, “ma’am this scanner’s getting hot. Ma’am? Ma’am? It’s getting really hot, it’s-“

His head began to ache. Something was coursing through his head, like a strange kind of ache.

“Ma’am! Ma’am! Ma’am!?”


	6. Ivy the Terrible

_Lily was knelt on her chair, tapping on the glass of the fish tank. She liked watching them swim around, it was very soothing. She liked to try and look them in the eye and think what they might be thinking. What would they think of her, this giant pink monster, staring at them. Would they think she’d eat them? She wouldn’t eat them, she loved them. She’d named one Tracy; the rainbow scaled one. Tracy was so beautiful for a fish._

_The room had another kid on the other side who was sat with his mom, or so it looked. He looked kind of shy but he was looking intently at the fish. Lily decided to ignore him, she was enjoying the fish too much and she didn’t want to have to deal with some other kid trying to name Tracy something dumb like Jennifer, or Caroline._

_Actually, Caroline was a really good name. Tracy will now be Caroline. Lily smiled to herself._

_The boy shuffled to the fish tank and Lily tensed at the approach. His mom was watching him – when he turned to look at her, she gave him a little wave to say that ‘it’s okay, she won’t bite.’ She might bite, he didn’t know. He might bite. What if he bit?_

_When he got to the tank he began watching the tank of fish and then started tapping on the glass. Lily felt upset; he couldn’t tap on the glass, what if the fish got too interested in him and not her. She started tapping louder and harder on her side. Caroline wasn’t too fussed but she did looked confused._

_“I like fish,” uttered the boy, “do you like fish?”_

_Lily didn’t answer him and continued watching them and tapping. She avoided eye contact so he didn’t try talking anymore._

_The boy eventually lost interest in trying to make a new friend and stuck to the fish. Caroline bobbed up and little and swished her tail, causing the boy to laugh. Lily also found it funny and they shared a smile._

_Then her Aunt Leah appeared again in the waiting room._

_“Lily, come on,” she called, “it’s time to check up.”_

_Aunt Leah took Lily’s hand and they walked away from the waiting room into the hallway of doctor’s rooms. It wasn’t a long walk, but Lily found her mind drifting already. She saw a woman walking down with a basket of flowers. And for a moment, Lily saw Caroline in the colours; reds, whites, yellows, greens and purples._

_In the doctor’s room was a sofa and a coffee table, on which a glass of orange juice sat, and an armchair which was set in front of a desk with a bookshelf beside it. The doctor, who Lily had met before, was sat on the armchair looking kindly; her name was Doctor Fitzgerald which Lily had difficult remembering. Her aunt sat Lily down on the sofa beside her, hanging onto her hand._

_“Here, she is,” declared Leah._

_Doctor Fitzgerald leant forward, “how are you today Lily?”_

_Lily didn’t say anything, she shyly turned away to avoid eye contract and tried looking for something more interesting. She liked the paintings that the doctor had on the wall, they were very colourful. Especially the one with the painting of flowers. It was a vase full of flowers, tulips, roses, lilies, violets, and all manner of colours. She thought of Caroline’s rainbow scales. She liked colours._

_Fitzgerald wasn’t surprised that Lily was avoiding talking. So far the sessions weren’t getting any closer to getting her to talk, but that was okay; Fitzgerald had plans._

_“Lily, did you read the books I gave you last time?” asked Fitzgerald._

_Leah had to nudge Lily so that she looked at Fitzgerald, and she finally nodded._

_“What do you think, you want to try some signs with me?” asked Fitzgerald._

_Lily shyly nodded again._

_“Great, how about an easy one?” asked Fitzgerald, and she waved, “hello?”_

_Leah, attempting to help motivate her niece also waved, looking at Lily. Lily took a second, but she copied them, waving strong and wildly, causing them all to laugh._

_“Well done! How about ‘me’?” asked Fitzgerald, and pointed at herself, “or ‘you’?” and she pointed at Lily._

_Lily copied, and laughed when Fitzgerald smiled._

_The session continued, Fitzgerald doing different hand signs and having Lily copy, until she began to ask some questions so that Lily could answer on her own._

_“So Lily, what do you like?” asked Fitzgerald, “you can point to something if that helps you be understood.”_

_Lily looked around the room. She pointed at Leah. Leah smiled._

_“What else?”_

_Lily took another look around and stuck her tongue out to think. She spied the paintings at the back and pointed at her favourite with the colourful flowers._

_“Flowers huh?” affirmed Fitzgerald, and Lily nodded happily. “Well this sign is flowers,” and Fitzgerald pinched her thumb and finger and ran it in front of her nose._

_Lily copied her and smiled._

_“Very good Lily! This was very good, I think we’ll leave it there for today and we’ll make some more sessions to learn some more yeah? Remember to practise the signs we learnt,” Fitzgerald said._

_They gave their goodbyes and Leah took Lily’s hand to take her out. Lily was ecstatic. She felt like she was being understood. It was amazing to be understood, it’d been so long since someone could tell what she meant so easily. She looked up and Leah and signed ‘flowers’ again. Leah smiled and copied her._

_“Flowers, yes!” said Leah._

_They passed the waiting room where the fish tank was. The boy was no longer there. Caroline was still hanging around the tank. It looked like she was looking at Lily. Excitedly she signed ‘flowers’._

_The fish glubbed and stared blankly._

_*_

Dirk woke up to sounds in the kitchen area. He roused himself up out of the duvet and stretched in his shirt. He felt like he had slept with a pea stuck in his back. Or maybe a remote control. Oh, it was a remote control! He should’ve checked the sofa before putting the bedding down.

He squinted in the light to see that it was eight on the clock. Jon’s bedding was on the floor, but Jon was nowhere to be seen. In the kitchen was the barista from the coffee shop that Dirk had met the day before.

“Hello!” he announced, “we’ve met before!”

The woman turned to see him, smiled, and nodded happily.

“I’m Dirk, Dirk gently, I’m sorry that we ended up taking over your living room. It’s a lovely place you have in here,” he said, “I would love an apartment like this. Our agency isn’t in a bad way itself, but you know what I mean, if I could live above the agency I think I’d love it more.”

The woman held up the kettle and pointed to it.

“Oh yes please,” said Dirk, “two sugars. Do you know where the man who was sleeping here with me went? Not sleeping with, sleeping nearby I mean.”

She laughed silently and nodded, pointed toward the hallway where the sound of a shower running was coming from. From the hallway emerged Bobby, who was putting his buttons together on the shirt he was wearing.

“Ah Dirk, we need to have an update,” said Bobby as he whirled into the kitchen and kissed the mute woman on the cheek, “hey babe.”

“Good plan, I should give Todd and Farah a ring,” said Dirk.

“Yes, but in a minute,” said Bobby, picking up a cup of tea that his girlfriend had made him, “so I spent early this morning talking with the department on what’s going to happen. Missy reported there was a murder last night.”

“A murder!? Was it-“

Bobby held up his hands, “no it wasn’t either of your friends. Someone at the zoo. She ended up taking your friends to their hotel so they’re okay. Missy is home and, really, I’ll expect she’ll stay there – as a special constable she’s had it rough. I’ve got to go back to the station to help sort things out.

“A patrol will be sent out around here to keep and eye on Jon until we find the clothed man again. The ARU has also been involved and they’re at the station now. No one knows that Jon is here apart from a few officers involved in this case so they’ll be making sure he’s safe until the clothed man is arrested.”

Bobby sighed and rubbed his eye, “but last Dirk, the department has issued that you are to return to the US immediately. You are no longer welcome on British soil whilst this case is unfolding.”

Dirk was surprised at this news, “what? No, I’m on the case, you can’t pull me off.”

“No, the Edinburgh police are now on the case. You are not to get involved. Your track record with cases in the past has always put people in danger and the department is not willing to risk you remaining in the area. If you do, they are putting together a case to lock you up.”

“I didn’t do anything though!” said Dirk, “this isn’t my fault!”

“They’re pulling together anything they can to make an airtight case. I’m sorry Dirk. They’ve asked me to accompany you to the airport to make sure you get on a plane and leave before I go to the station.”

“You can’t do this,” said Dirk, moving round to approach Bobby, but also realising he wasn’t wearing trousers and was just in a shirt and boxers, “look, when I’m involved there’s no way to remove me from it. That’s just how it works. I’m sorry about everything, I know that I don’t really bring good news with me, but none of this will end until I solve the case.”

Bobby gave him a long stare, “Dirk, I can’t risk Lily being involved,” he said, gesturing to the woman, his girlfriend, “she could get hurt in all this. I can’t have that.”

Lily, who had been leaving them to have the conversation finally approached them, signing, “(what’s going on? What is this all about?)”

“Bobby, can I call you Bob? Look Bob, I understand, but she’s now been involved. She’s connected so even without me she’s at risk.”

Bobby pressed his lips together, “I don’t like you saying that.”

“I understand but the faster we solve the case, the faster we can stop all this bad stuff happening. We just need to grit our teeth and bear through.”

“Everything’s connected huh?” said Bobby, “tell me, do you have any idea who the clothed man might be? What he wants with Jon’s dead wife?”

Dirk grimaced, “okay no, I don’t have a lot of answers. But if you want, I’ve got questions? I’ve got a lot of them, you can have a question instead.”

“This is not how you solve a case,” said Bobby, pressing a finger into the kitchen counter to make a point, “you collect evidence, you track down suspects, you catalogue motives. Where’s your files?”

“All in here,” said Dirk, tapping his head.

Bobby took a sip, set his mug down and folded his arms, “a girl called Alice O’Connor was potentially murdered at the Edinburgh zoo last night. The paramedics said it looked like suicide, but Missy was adamant that someone else was at the zoo at the time and hence was a suspect. She couldn’t tell me everything because she was traumatised. Can you tell me how that fits into anything?”

Dirk looked to see if Jon had come out the bathroom, but the shower was still running, “okay so we have a VHS tape that said Edinburgh Zoo on its label. And it had been scribbled out and replaced with Ava. Todd and Farah, my companions, had found a computer there that had once belonged to Henry Miller. And Henry Miller used to own Jon’s bookshop!”

He gestured as if it all made sense. Both Lily and Bobby stared at him confused.

“And?” asked Bobby, urging Dirk to lead on.

“Ava died twenty years ago, Henry Miller disappeared twenty years ago- your father disappeared twenty years ago! I’m sorry but it’s not a coincidence that you’re involved either, your father obviously had a part to play in this,” Dirk sighed, “I’m sorry but if we need answers we’ll have to dig into your father’s case.”

Bobby sighed, hands on the back of his head. Lily put an arm around him, “(it’s okay, take a deep breath.)”

“Thanks Lily,” said Bobby, “I dropped that case a long time ago. It’s unsolvable,” he stated.

“Only because you didn’t have these other points that I had! You see the nuances of cause and effect are much more subtle that you might realise.”

“(I don’t think it’s a good idea you dredge up your father’s case.)” signed Lily.

“What did she say?” asked Dirk.

“What I was thinking, my father’s case is a personal point of trauma for me Dirk, I’m not going to root around closets for skeletons that I buried long ago,” he said.

“Look, all I’m asking is for us to just take a look into it. With me there, we may find something,” Dirk continued, trying to convince Bobby.

In Bobby’s head, he was fighting against the curiosity that had nagged him for years. Sitting in the back of his head ever since his father had disappeared when he was only seven years old. It was one of the reasons he got into the police service. But he’d dropped the idea of solving it years ago when there was nothing new that could be gleamed. No matter how many files he pawed over, or spent late nights drinking coffee and listening to Countdown on the TV in the background as he tried to piece together what had happened.

“I’m sorry Dirk,” he said, and he moved back into the hallway, “get ready, you catching the first flight we can.”

Dirk sighed and landed on the sofa, feeling dejected and stuck. He rubbed his hands over his face. He didn’t notice Lily approach from behind him and put a hand on his shoulder. He looked up and smiled at her.

“I’m sorry, Lily was it?” he said.

Lily nodded, “(I’m sorry.)”

“I’m sorry I don’t understand,” he lifted his hands and dropped them in defeat, “this won’t stop until I get to the bottom of it. There’s something that links all this together you know?”

“(Links what together?)”

“Sorry, what does (links) mean?”

Lily tried signing like the links of a chain.

“Oh link? You mean link?”

She nodded.

“You know about the links?”

She shook her head and tried again to indicate she wanted to know more. It was like a game of charades, but last time Dirk had played charades he had mistaken ‘Lord of the Rings’ for ‘Love Actually’ and he’d never lived it down. Jon reappeared in the room with a towel around him and noticed Lily attempting to sign to Dirk, who was thinking she was talking about babies or rugby.

“She wants to know what’s happened,” said Jon, causing both Dirk and Lily to look up. Lily was surprised but pleased that there was another person who knew sign language.

“You know sign language?” confirmed Dirk.

“Some,” said Jon, “I learnt it shortly before Blackwing in fact.”

Dirk turned to Lily, “well Jon here is being chased by a clothed man. He got trapped in his bookshop while they broke his windowsill and that same man chased us to the police station, hurting a few people. He’s looking for Ava, Jon’s wife, and we don’t know why. And there’s a man named Henry Miller involved somehow. And possibly your boyfriend’s dad,” Dirk tried to summarise.

“Don’t forget the ivy,” said Jon, drying his hair with another towel, picking up his clothes and then returning to the hallway.

“Oh yes, the ivy,” and Dirk elaborated, “Jon’s bathroom was covered in ivy, it had grown from his bathroom sink. I don’t know how it fits in, but Jon said it grown almost overnight.”

Lily had stopped nodding as he said this, and her eyes followed him intensely before she signed, “(ivy?)”

“I’m sorry I still don’t-“

She waved her hands in the air, dismissing the idea. She looked at him awkwardly as if she was hiding something, which Dirk immediately picked up upon. Like an embarrassing secret. The kind of look you get when a child has wet the bed and doesn’t want to tell their parents, but they know they have to else they’re going to have to sleep in wet bed clothes.

“Do you know something?”

She slowly nodded this time. She picked herself up and took Dirk’s hand, leading him to follow her.

“Wait, wait,” he said, and grabbed his trousers, and stuck his legs through them as he reached his shoes, “that’s the thing with cases like this, it’s very easy to forget you’re not wearing clothes.”

He dressed himself to an adequate degree and followed her as she took him downstairs back to the back door, and the door that lead into the coffee shop. Then she took a detour to a set of stairs that went down into a cellar. A little makeshift sign had been stuck up with cellotape that said ‘Lily’s Garden’.

“Ooh, plants,” he said, “ah yes you are the botanist I suppose! Wait a moment-“

He didn’t finish the thought as she unlocked the door and slowly opened the door. It was dark inside apart from some fluorescent tube lighting n the ceiling, but a couple bulbs had gone and one was flickering as a slightly lower hertz. It looked like there used to be some small boxes with which plants would grow it, with lamps hanging over them, but the lamps’ bulbs had shattered.

Yet again, the room was overtaken by ivy. It was growing everywhere. It spanned the whole room. It grew up walls, over the ceiling tiles, over the floors, the stems about an inch thick. Dirk was engrossed in the fact it was almost exactly like Jon’s bathroom.

“You had an outbreak as well?” he asked.

Lily lifted a shoulder, as if to say ‘not exactly’.

Dirk put a hand to one of the leaves of the ivy. It was real. It was a real living plant, growing in the room, trying to get as much light as it could. He smiled.

“I told him, when Bobby see’s this, he’ll understand. Everything’s connected!”

Lily approached Dirk and put her hands on his arms and shook her head with a determined look on her face.

“Don’t tell him?”

She gave a strained look, saying that wasn’t it either.

“Oh,” Dirk said realising, “you don’t want him on the case,” he reached for her hand, “I’m sorry. There have been times when the people involved in a case have tried to run away and it’s never ended well. We’re all involved. We’re all at risk. We’ve got to solve this.”

He raced to the door to go back into the flat, leaving Lily standing in her garden. She clenched a fist. She didn’t want Bobby going on a wild goose chase, chasing after a father that was gone. She knew that pain all too well; she knew the pain of lost parents.

*

Todd clutched Farah round her waist and drew her in closer. His face wiggled to fit into her hair, but there was no good position where a stray hair wouldn’t find its way into his nostril and cause him to shake it out. It wasn’t long until Farah stirred awake as well.

“What time is it?” she asked, shakily, stretching her arms but pressing back into Todd further.

“Not important,” said Todd, “we can lie in.”

“Did Dirk call?” she asked.

“Come on, I love Dirk, but can we have some time to ourselves for once?” asked Todd, leaning his cheek onto the back of Farah’s shoulder.

“We could if we hadn’t been attacked last night, we’re basically in DEFCON 2,” said Farah, but her eyes were still closed as she said this.

“We weren’t the ones attacked,” said Todd, “look I’d rather not remember that right now, I’m too busy enjoying this.”

Farah nuzzled backward, but then rolled over so she could face Todd, “seriously though, we are on a case.”

“And it’ll still be there when we decide to get up.”

Farah smiled and rested her head into Todd’s chest. Todd began to stroke down her back. Farah listened to Todd’s breathing, feeling his chest rise up and down with her head. Then Todd reached round behind him to the beside table and picked up his pill bottle, trying not to disturb Farah, and popped one into his mouth.

“When did we last get a moment like this?” asked Todd.

“Back in Montana I guess,” suggested Farah, “wait do you mean sharing a bed, or the quiet?”

“Both,” said Todd.

“Good because there are multiple times we had one but not the other,” said Farah. She rolled over to look up at the ceiling, “do you think Missy will be alright?”

Todd thought on it, “well she’s home now. She doesn’t need to be part of anything now.”

“But she’s already been involved,” said Farah, “doesn’t that mean she’s involved whether she wants to be or not?”

Todd mused on it, “I guess so,” he chewed on it, “do you feel she’s in danger.”

Farah then sat up, “technically, we’re also in danger Todd. We’re not Dirk, the universe isn’t looking out for us. Do you think one day we’re going to end up like Alice? Just another casualty in a case that has nothing to do with us?”

Todd pondered for a moment then smiled, “isn’t that true of everyone? Anyone who dies is a casualty in a case that is nothing to do with them. You get hit by a drunk driver, you get hit in the head by a brick, or even if you die on a bed when you’re old. You’re always just the death in someone else’s story.”

“That doesn’t really comfort me,” said Farah, “like I’m saying we could die.”

“We could die anyway.”

“That’s still not helping!”

Todd lifted his hands, “I can’t promise you we’re not going to die. But I can say it will mean something when you do,” and he grabbed Farah for a hug, “and I’ll be around when it happens.”

Farah was still not comforted. That was the trouble with death, only the religious really had a comfort mechanism. If you were a Christian, you could believe there was an afterlife. If you were Sikh or a Hindu, you could believe in reincarnation. But an atheist had nothing to fall back on, everything would be taken away from you. And to be taken from life early was a horrid thought.

Premature death. It was like premature ejaculation. You have all these plans and then it happens way to early and interrupts all your plans. And makes those around you feel crappy. It’s such an inconvenience. Farah then found she couldn’t help but think about the Grim Reaper having sex and she couldn’t stop picturing the skeleton body stripping off the hood and revealing-

Well actually there would be nothing. Skeletons don’t have genitals.

“Don’t think about it,” said Todd, causing Farah to switch back to reality, unsure if Todd was talking about premature death or the Grim Reaper naked.

“Alright,” she laid back down and Todd joined.

“Shall I order some room service? Maybe I can get a bellhop rate.”

“Yeah get us something to drink,” she said, and then thought for a moment, “see if we can get some jelly babies. They’re meant to be weird over here.”

*

Bobby could do without the weirdness invading his personal space. He almost wished he had Missy around again. He preferred the preparedness he got from a spoiler, to the unpreparedness he had with this. He liked knowing that Snape killed Dumbledore, or that Soylent Green was people. He didn’t like not knowing where this ivy came from.

“Where did this ivy come from?” he asked, directing the question to Lily, who was awkwardly standing near the door as Dirk looked around the room.

She began to sign, “(It started growing about three weeks ago. I bred it to have pretty flowers.)”

“You bred it?”

“(Yeah. But it grew so fast, I have to trim it everyday.)”

Bobby sighed, “why not kill it.”

Lily shuffled her feet, “(Don’t hate me.)”

“Why would I hate you?”

“(I put it in the coffee.)”

Bobby whirled on his feet in disbelief, “what?”

“(It makes people kind of easy to influence. They buy more coffee that way.)”

“What’s she saying?” asked Dirk, who had noticed the one-sided conversation.

“She’s saying she grew this ivy, and she puts it in the coffee she sells,” he returned to grilling Lily, “in what part did you think that was legal?”

“How did this end up in Jon’s bathroom?” asked Dirk out loud.

“(I don’t know, I’ve kept it down here,)” signed Lily, sighing.

“She doesn’t know,” translated Bobby.

“But you see Bob? This links you and Jon in a way you never would have realized! You’re involved in our case. You have to let me look into your father,” said Dirk urgently, “please don’t take me to the airport.”

Bobby did not like it.

Dirk left the argument to stew in Bobby and turned his attention to Lily, “why do you put it in coffee?”

“(It makes people complacent. Like easy to talk to. And easy to get to buy more coffee,)” signed Lily, which Bobby translated for Dirk. She then showed by taking a knife and scraping the bark off of the ivy stems into a glass. The ground brown looked almost like coffee granules, you’d never know if she mixed it with the ground beans.

“Yes, that definitely seems illegal.”

“(It’s natural.)”

“So are hallucinogens, you don’t get people putting fucking heroin in coffee!” said Bobby, raising his voice, “you gotta kill this thing.” Lily nodded sadly. “And you!” Bobby pointed at Dirk, “none of this convinces me my dad has any involvement in your case,” Dirk was about to argue, but Bobby held up his hand, “but you’ve got me curious. Your manipulation of my emotional trauma with my dad’s disappearance has won you big time. I’ll take you ON THE WAY to the airport, alright? Then you can just ‘take a look’ like you want. Nothing more!”

Dirk was excitable again, “don’t you worry, you’ll see! When I solve the case, you’ll be rid of all your trauma. And probably have some new trauma instead!”

“I already do.”

“Oh yes,” Dirk remembered the station, “so in a way I owe you one trauma-removal! A trauma-ectomy.”

“Let’s just get ready,” Bobby stated, “Lily, we’ll leave Jon with you. Keep him here and don’t let him out of your sight. If he does anything stupid, call me.”

Lily saluted military style which caused Bobby to laugh a little, whilst trying to maintain a steely glare to show he was annoyed that she was dosing her coffee with a possible new drug.

When they got back up to the apartment, Dirk grabbed his jacket and Bobby went to get his keys. Jon was in the kitchen, finishing up a glass of water and before they began heading out the door Jon called out to stop them.

“Wait Dirk,” he yawned, “wait I need to tell you something.”

Dirk pointed at Bobby, “we’re about to head out as part of the case, but what do you need?”

Jon ended up gripping the back of the sofa as he walked over to Dirk, “I need to tell you,” he yawned even larger and louder, “about Ava.”

Dirk snapped his attention at Jon, but Jon was losing his fight with gravity and the man was slowly dropping to the ground, his eyelids flickering slightly as they struggled to stay open. “Jon, are you alright?”

“I’m just,” he struggled to say, but it was now a whisper, “just need a nap… Ava… She’s… My tape… She’s…” he couldn’t put the sentence together and with the last word, his head lolled and he almost fell backward. Instead he remained sitting up against the sofa.

Bobby was at his side checking his pulse and breathing. Lily was on guard as well. When Bobby had determined he had a pulse, and that he was still breathing he gave Dirk a bewildered look.

“Did he just fall asleep?” asked Dirk.

“Seems like it,” said Bobby, “he might be exhausted. Did he get any sleep last night?”

“I don’t know I was too busy sleeping,” said Dirk, “maybe he should’ve had the sofa.”

Bobby snapped his fingers, “it’s the narcolepsy. That things that’s been rolling around town,” he stood up, “we don’t really have time, he should be fine. Lily you keep him safe and let us know if he wakes up. Come on.”

“We don’t have time? What’s the rush?” asked Dirk.

Bobby was at the door, “you think I’m gonna tell the station about our pit stop? They think you’re on a plane and we’ll keep it that way.”

*

Patel was on the phone with his feet up on the desk in front of him. He was listening to the one-sided conversation on the other end and tapping at the keys on his keyboard one at a time. In front of him was the entrance to the police station which had people rushing about moving things, but a calm collected effort rather than a frantic one. As if the attack had been a nuisance rather than a huge flaw in police station security. This was exactly how Patel took it, he now had to relay a bunch of orders from the higher-ups to the officers, and he’d much rather play Age of War.

“Yeah, yeah, no,” he added, hearing he’d been asked a question, and trying to dismiss it.

He sighed away from the receiver and waited for the next action. They had a conference call so he didn’t need to pay too much attention. Then the doors to the station opened up and he perked up a bit, seeing a proper reaction and a good reason for procrastination. His ear was starting to hurt.

It was a blonde woman who was dressed in a black uniform with a gun holster around her belt, and behind her followed two figures. But both were dressed heavily and hid most of their visible features. For a moment he thought they might be the person of interest who’d caused all the mess, but they didn’t fit the description; they wore similar uniforms. One was large and wide, the other pretty thin near the top but bottom heavy.

“Hey,” he said, greeted them with a wave, “who are you?”

We’re the security firm hired to assist in the situation,” said the woman speaking on behalf of her company, “armed response?”

“Oh right, what was it, Octopus or something?” Patel said, lifting himself up leaning back, and sitting straight, putting the phone on mute but keeping the handset in audible range.

“Yes, Octagon, I’m Jonquil Kowalska,” she announced, “you want to give me the breakdown?”

“Yeah so the fugitive is currently accounted for. He entered the building, caused mass disturbance and couple of injuries. The city is on a hunt for the guy but there’s no leads yet. They’ve been determined as dangerous, inhuman strength and so on,” said Patel, “I didn’t see it, it was yesterday’s shift so that’s all I got on file. Wearing a lot of clothes to hide their identity.

“When our officers find him, they want you on scene but until then it’s just a waiting game. No sir,” called out Patel, aiming to the receiver when he heard his name being used in a derogatory fashion.

“What was the perpetrator after?” asked Jonquil.

“Er, they said he was after someone we had in the cell. They’ve been moved to a safe location and under surveillance in case the fugitive appears,” said Patel, “some guy said he was famous but I’d never heard of him.”

“Any details you can impart?” asked Jonquil.

“I’ll print some off, but they just want you on standby, you don’t need to see the guy. They’ve got patrol cars,” said Patel.

“I just would be interested in who we’re protecting,” said Jonquil.

Patel gave her a confused look, but dropped it, “eh, I don’t really care. As long as you can be called out whatever.” He slowly tapped on a keyboard and grunted, “bloody printer.”

Jonquil sighed folding her arms, “seems he did a number.”

“The guys upstairs want to know how he couldn’t be reprimanded. The officer who tried to confront the guy said he’d used a taser and physical force, but nobody believes they didn’t work. Maybe he had a rubber suit on or something.”

Patel whirled around on his chair and pulled out some paper from the printer and then turned back to hand it to Jonquil.

“Jonathan Carlyle huh?” asked Jonquil.

“You know the guy?”

“I’ve heard of him. That’s very interesting,” she said.

“He was on mastermind or something. Was charged with squatting,” said Patel.

“And the officer who has custody is Robert Louis? How old is he?”

“Uh he’s like twenty-seven? Why?”

“I thought it was someone I knew, but never mind,” Jonquil’s face was slowly gaining a smile that unnerved Patel, but he put it down to the security firm types. They were always so ‘in the job’. Plus they got to carry guns – only weirdos carried guns.

“Yeah so they’ve got him held up in Livingston. Gotta be discrete so no major police presence just a patrol,” said Patel.

“Of course,” said Jonquil, “and who’s this Dirk Gently? Or these two: Farah Black and Todd Brotzman?”

Patel lifted his hands up, “can’t say about the Todd or Farah, but Dirk has been labelled a ‘disturber of the peace’” and Patel used his fingers to make the quotations marks, “they’re sending him back to the US today. You know he was arrested for stealing a car from Windsor Castle?”

“You don’t say,” said Jonquil, clearly disinterested. Patel knew this but didn’t take offence; he was half-interested anyway.

“He was in the cell with that Carlyle when the attack happened. Just a bystander by the sounds,” said Patel.

Jonquil handed the paper to the larger figure behind her, “Wung take this.”

The larger of the men took the paper with large gloved hands and folded it to carry.

“Any news on the fugitive?” continued Jonquil, picking out a water bottle from her belt and gulping from it, and checked her watch.

“Nah, they think he’s injured but we got nothing on the guy. Officers are just crawling anywhere they can find him. They’re making a wanted ad right now,” said Patel, “oh yeah sir I’ll get on that.”

He put down the handset after the final words and relaxed at the fact he’d no longer have to hear about their whining. He then considered the woman properly. She seemed like there was buzz of excitement around her, as if she’d received some pleasant news. As if she’d learnt they were bringing back peanut butter Kit-Kat Chunkies. Oh he could do with a break himself, he needed a smoke.

“Okay thanks, we’ll stay on alert,” said Jonquil, she gestured to the doors.

“You wanna help tidy things up around here?” asked Patel, gesturing to the mess.

“Sorry, but that’s not what we’re hired for,” she uttered and ignored him further as she left with the two hulking figures following closely.

Patel actually felt glad that was over, now he could take that break.

*

The clothed man was slumped between some bins in an alleyway, considering their next move. They were injured, they’re leg was almost unusable and they were going to have trouble getting back onto their feet. It was silly to have attacked the police station; now they were being hunted by the police and they were marked as dangerous. They’d managed to hide under everyone’s radar for so long and now they had been thrust into the spotlight. And they most definitely couldn’t dance right now.

They put a hand to their head; their mind seemed to be failing as time went on. Chunks were missing, blank, it was hard to remember things or even think about things. It was if it were a jigsaw someone hadn’t finished, but they couldn’t find those missing pieces. It wasn’t meant to go this way.

If they could talk to Ava, she would be able to fix this, they were sure.

A police car rolled past the road at the end of the alley. Luckily the clothed man was out of sight enough not to draw attention.

They’d lost Jon now. It had been a fluke that they’d found Jon at the police station – they’d seen someone was squatting at their bookshop, and when the police took an interest, they’d followed them. Who could’ve known it would be Jon of all people. After they’d spent so long looking for him.

The clothed man rolled up their trouser leg to inspect the damage. The metallic rods and plates that made up their leg were fine, but the motors were damaged. They could probably still walk, but if they hit any uneven ground there was no telling what would happen. They could fall. Metal limbs were all well and good when the electronics were working, but now it was dead weight. They needed a walking stick.

Focusing on their leg, they didn’t notice a golden Labrador, a little matted, nosing into the alleyway and poking its nose near the bins where the clothed man was. It made a little noise when it knocked over some discard boxes and the clothed man whipped their head to the dog.

“Oh,” said the clothed man out loud, “hey boy. You lost?”

The dog, seeming to understand the clothed man, approached them. It considered the man cautiously.

“It’s alright, I won’t hurt you,” said the clothed man, “I feel lost as well.”

The dog tilted its head at the clothed man.

“Maybe you can help me, and I’ll help you huh?” asked the clothed man, “you think you could find me a stick? A walking stick or something?”

The dog seemed to understand what the clothed man said again and it began to nose into the trash. It trotted down the alleyway and investigated what it could find, before running down the alleyway and out onto the street.

The clothed man laughed, “that’s a good dog.” They tried to recall if they had a dog earlier in their life but the memories were missing.

A few minutes later, the dog had returned. With a walking stick in their mouth. It wasn’t a bad one either, it looked high quality. Polished wood, a fine wood stain.

“Where did you get this?” asked the clothed man. They stood up shakily on their leg, using the walking stick to help support themselves, but it did the job. “That’s perfect, thank boy.”

The dog sat on its haunches and panted in a smile at the clothed man. The clothed man approached it and patted it on the head.

“We’re back on the move,” said the clothed man, “if only we had an idea where Jon was. You want to join me boy?” The dog didn’t move much but the clothed man took it as a positive. “Alright, this might not be so bad. It’s been a lonely time. I’ve been searching for the last year on my own, all over. And even before that I was alone. When I got this body, I didn’t really have anyone around. Robert had been taken. And Ava was…” the man sighed, “but with you I have one friend.

“I’ll be able to get back to normal life soon I’m sure. All I need is Ava. She’ll know what to do.”

The clothed man bent down, “I don’t suppose you know where Jon has gone?” he asked rhetorically.

The dog lifted its head in contemplation, then said, “not yet but I’m sure we’ll find him.”


	7. Electronic Spiders

_It’s 1995. Police men are scattered in the marshes behind the house. I’m in my room. I’m at the window watching my electric spider moved around my desk. I’m hoping they find my dad. They think he fell over. I hope he’s okay._

_My door opens and it’s my mum. She’s got a plate with a sandwich on it; it’s just cheese and tomato. She knows I don’t like lettuce. I love my mum._

_“Hey Bobby,” she says, “shuid we go oot‘n watch a movie? Git oot o’house?”_

_I shake my head. What if I miss something? I poke the electric spider and it retreats, holding up its front legs. It makes me smile._

_“Is he really oot thar ma?” I ask. I’m scared. I hope he’s okay._

_“If they fin’ him we’ll ken,” said my mum._

_Out the window I could see them opening up the shed._

_“Ma they’re gawn intae his shed! They’re nae suppose tae be in thar!”_

_“It’s a’richt bairn, they’re juist looking,” she started stroking my head when she said this._

_I am annoyed. They don’t get to go into dad’s shed. Only dad’s allowed in the shed. They’d probably break something._

_I watched them as they combed the marshes, with sticks and all sorts. One guy has a torch that lit up spots in the marsh like a spotlight. It was like my dad was on the run, and they were hunting him down. Part of me didn’t want them to find him. He would get into trouble, and then the police would tell him off._

_What if he stopped making me toys?_

_“I miss da.”_

_“Me too, Bobby, me too.”_

_*_

Dirk perked up and said, “do you think counting sheep actually works to help you sleep? I’ve never tried, but it sounds too easy, you know? Like that whole, ‘if you eat cheese before bed it’ll give you nightmares’, malarkey. I don’t believe in cheese giving nightmares, its so unassuming of a food.”

Bobby could tell what he was doing and he let his shoulders relax a little, “I don’t know about counting sheep, but counting elephants helps me relax.”

“Elephants? Do you see many elephants?” asked Dirk.

“No, you just imagine them in your head,” and Bobby paused, “did you think counting sheep meant actually going outside and counting sheep?”

“Well when you say it like that it sounds ridiculous,” said Dirk, and pouted.

Okay, Bobby THOUGHT he could tell what Dirk was doing.

They were in the patrol car – a new one, after the last had its bonnet half-destroyed at the run in with the police station’s gate. They’d left that old one at the Botanist with the patrol. Now they were heading just outside of Livingston, only about twenty minutes away. Bobby explained it was his childhood home, and his mother stilled lived there, so Dirk was to be on his best behaviour.

Dirk then had to phone Todd to update him of his current trajectory, but it had gone to voicemail so he left a long summary of the events. Dirk wasn’t very good with voicemails, he sometimes forgot that there wasn’t actually someone listening at that very moment and kept edging for a reply when he knew there wasn’t one coming. This ended up causing his voicemail to become three voicemails, which Bobby eventually had to start nudging him so he wouldn’t forget he had a time limit, ending up in moments where it sounded like:

“…so we’ve left Jon asleep on the couch, and he should be safe because like I said, there’s a patrol outside, and Lily is such a nice host, you know she offered me tea? (ow) Sorry yes, so he’s being cared for. Do you think it’d a good idea for us to regroup there? (ow!) Sorry, I think we should regroup at the Botanist and work out where to go next after I’ve come back from Bobby’s mother’s place – I cannot wait to meet her! (OW that wasn’t even called for!)”

After the voicemails, Dirk switched the topic, “so I’ve been meaning to ask. Not ask her herself of course, but your girlfriend. Why doesn’t she talk?”

Bobby gave him a sideways glance, “no idea. She’s been like it ever since she was young. She went through some trauma when she was much younger and hasn’t spoken a word since.”

“What kind of trauma?”

“She’s never said. Or signed actually,” said Bobby, “I met her in that coffeeshop only a couple of years and since then we’ve been dating,” he resigned a little to anger, “I wish she’d told me about that ivy. That was stupidly irresponsible. She can be so naïve sometimes its-” he huffed, “…adorable.”

“Aww, you like her,” said Dirk in a mocking tone of voice.

“…Yeah we’ve been dating. It’d be weird if I didn’t like her.”

“You fancy Lily.”

“Again. We’ve been dating.”

They eventually ended up on a country lane and whirled into a gravel driveway to an old farmhouse conversion. The walls were white and the windows were stained, and the roof slates were a mish-mash of reds and oranges and browns. It looked as if it hadn’t had any work done in thirty years or so, leaving a lot to be desired.

Bobby let Dirk out the car and Bobby led the way, not to the front door, but off the driveway to a wooden gate hidden in the hedge. He opened it and they were in the garden, with a path of stone slabs leading to the back door, where the kitchen windows looked out. Here they saw who must’ve been Bobby’s mother, a middle-aged woman with her hair curly and black, left untied so it sprouted out her head, and wearing fitted clothes; a long-sleeved top with floral patterns on and some skinny jeans.

When Bobby opened up the kitchen door that led inside, she embraced him into a hug.

“A haven’t seen ye in ages, ma wee laddie,” she squeezed him, “wit brings ye hame?”

A dog suddenly raced into the kitchen and barked a couple of times before attempting to climb up on Bobby’s person.

“Oi, doon! Bad dog!” said Bobby’s mother, but Bobby was too busy giving the dog affection.

“Who’s a good boy! Who’s a good boy!” said Bobby to the dog, rubbing his face.

Dirk felt a bit awkward at this, and so he tried to recall what to do from his book on small-talk.

“Hello,” he began, “nice weather-“

“AND who’s this? Whit a bonnie young coupon, is he freish tae th’force?” Bobby’s mother had already approached Dirk and placed her hands either side of his face to give a good look, “ma name’s Lorraine, but ma girls ca’ me Lorrie.”

Dirk stuttered a little at the sudden invasion of personal space, but managed to spit out, “I’m Dirk Gently, lovely to meet you Lorraine!”

“Ooh he’s a proper English ponce!” and she laughed, “Am pullin yer shank, shall a make a pot a’brew?”

“Yeah mum, thanks,” said Bobby, and Lorraine began to busy about in the kitchen.

Dirk then found that the dog was sniffing around him so he bent down to give the dog a little love and affection, “who’s this then?”

“That’s Bert,” said Bobby.

“Bobby and Bert. There’s a theme there somewhere,” mused Dirk, scratching Bert’s ears.

“Mum, Dirk is actually a detective,” started Bobby.

“Oh aye?”

“He’s interested in da,” said Bobby, “do you mind if we talk about him?”

Lorraine sighed, “oh Bobby, a thought you’d gotten ower this,” she turned to give him a mothering eye. She took a deep breath, “bin a fair while sae okay. Ye think this gangly fellow wull fin’ something nor-one else has?”

“You see I’m a holistic detective,” explained Dirk, “I believe in a fundamental interconnectedness of all events. The correlation between cause and effect are much more subtle than-“

“Aye, aye, a get it,” said Lorraine, her tone shifting now she knew that Dirk was here to dredge up her past, “well sit doon, ‘n a will tell ye wit yi’ll want tae ken.”

Lorraine brought the tea over and the conversation began. Dirk listened intently to the circumstances; Lorraine had been at work, and Bobby was at school. When they came home, Robert Senior (as his named was revealed) had disappeared without a trace. They’d called the police a couple days after to report he was missing, at which point they’d done a search of the property.

“We have marshes out the back so they thought he may have slipped, fell and possibly drowned. But no dice, they didn’t find him out there,” explained Bobby.

“What was your father like?” asked Dirk, using his detective knowledge to know that now he had circumstance, he needed motives.

Bobby smiled, “he was a good dad. Very creative. He loved making things with his hands. He was a lawyer by day, but at night he’d be in his shed making all sorts of things. He actually made me a lot of toys,” and Bobby laughed, before his face shifted to say, “it was hard when he disappeared.

“At first I thought it was my fault. You know, I was a kid, and I wasn’t the best kid. I thought he’d gotten tired of me.”

Lorraine took Bobby’s hand and rubbed it, “ye ken that wasn't true, he loved ye! He loved ye mair than me, he ne'er made me ony toys!”

Bobby laughed, “you know there’s a little hope inside of me. That’s he’s out there somewhere. Somehow.”

Lorraine looked down at this and stood up from the table.

“Did he have any enemies?” asked Dirk.

“He wis a feckin’ lawyer, a coorse he had enemies!” said Lorraine, a little louder than she had been talking, “just wit exactly dae ye think ye'll fin'? Ye bringing me back a' thae memories, wit's it fur eh?”

“Mom,” said Bobby standing up, but Lorraine waved her hands at him to stop him from coming closer, and then pressed a hand to her nose before leaving the kitchen.

Dirk looked pathetically at Bobby, “Sorry.”

“I knew this was a bad idea, she always got upset at me bringing up dad when I was investigating this years ago,” said Bobby, “I think she felt she had to get over it quickly because I was young. But it’s going to always be sore. He never said goodbye.”

Dirk stood up from the table as well, “do you mind if we have a look around? Where was his bedroom or his study?”

Bobby chuckled, “it’s been twenty years, everything’s moved around since. I think we have some of his old stuff in the attic, we can check there.”

Bobby took Dirk to the second floor of the house. Dirk noted the interior was rustic and wallpapered but well taken care of. He was surprised a working woman could do her job and also take such good care of the house. On the landing, Bobby pulled down the fold-up ladder that took them into the attic. He went up first and then Dirk followed. It was a small space, enough to stand in but not room to use it for anything but storage. Bobby trawled through the boxes and bags until he found a box of interest. Dirk had the torch in his phone on to help look around.

He spied a strange object that he exclaimed, “what’s this?”

Bobby turned his head, “I think he called it an automaton. He loved to make them when I was younger.”

“What does it do?”

“Turn the crank.”

Dirk did as instructed. The small wooden box of which he had spied had a wooden man stood on top with a wooden boulder on his shoulders. There was a crank to its side which, when he turned it, caused the man’s feet to move as if he were walking up a hill. Dirk was fascinated.

“That’s amazing,” he said excitedly.

“That’s not all, he loved stuff like that,” said Bobby, “here.”

And then Bobby produced from one of the boxes a brass spider. It had a key on its back that Bobby wound and then he placed the whole thing on the floor. The spider began to rotate its legs and slowly walk towards Dirk, lifting four legs at once, and then switching. Dirk was gobsmacked.

“This is truly magical. He made these for you?”

“Like I say, he liked making toys,” and then Bobby rustled in the boxes again, “and that was just version one. Version two is around here…”

Finally, he found another spider but made of stainless steel. It was bigger and bulkier and didn’t have a key on this one.

“This one is lighter, but we need some double-A batteries,” said Bobby, “he began making electrical ones after the clockwork. They were lighter and did much crazier stuff.”

“I am impressed, your dad was a genius! He was an inventor! Didn’t he patent any of this?” Dirk lauded.

“I don’t think so,” said Bobby, “he wasn’t interested in that. He would do it for fun I guess. He’d come home from work, lock up in his shed, and then after a week of it he’d come out with some brand new toy for me to play with.”

“Can we see the shed after we’re finished up here?” asked Dirk.

“Sure,” said Bobby, putting the spider back down, “he never used to let us in. He was very secretive about his methods.”

After about an hour of looking at old artefacts that were Robert Senior’s possessions, they wound up back outside into the garden. At the end of the garden was a set of fencing that cut off the marshes from the good ground, and on the other side of the marshes, half hidden by a patch of woodland was a large converted farming shed.

“I’m not wearing the right footwear for this,” said Dirk, “can I borrow some wellies?”

“It’s fine, I know the marshes like the back of my hand,” said Bobby, “just follow me.”

The marshes were patches of good soil and patches of sloppy and quicksand like mud. Dirk could see why the police could think it could kill someone. It didn’t help that the sky was overcast, threatening to rain and turn the marshes into an untraversable slush of mud and grass. He had to catch himself more than once before he ended up with a face full of mud, but Bobby had a handle on finding the right spots of dirt that were strong enough to sustain their weight.

When they got to the shed, Dirk could see it was large and long, with weathered wood that made up its walls, and no windows of descript. A telegraph pole stood next to it, connecting it to the house. Bobby opened one of the two main double-doors so they could go inside. The floor was solid concrete and when Bobby flicked on a switch, it revealed there were several lightbulbs to light the workshop. Standing dusty were various large pieces of machinery and tools.

“Definitely looks like a workshop,” said Dirk out loud, “so he’d make those toys out here?”

“Yep,” said Bobby, “we never knew exactly what he did in here, he’d never let me in when I was younger.”

There was a saw, a large wooden desk with a vice grip, a drill, a sander, a welder, a lathe – a smorgasbord of heavy duty machinery. They hadn’t looked used since the disappearance, which made sense.

“No sign of a struggle at the time,” stated Dirk, almost phrasing like a question, but Bobby shook his head in affirmation.

“Almost as if he just ran off,” said Bobby, “yet no one saw him again. He left everything behind.”

Dirk jumped up and down in place, closing his eyes as he did so. He whispered to himself, “where do I go, where do I go?”

“What are you doing?” asked Bobby.

“Trying to get an idea of where to go,” admitted Dirk, “I’m not getting any direction here.”

Bobby scoffed, “this case is twenty years cold Dirk. I told you, there’s nothing to find here. It’s been done and dusted,” he shook his head, “I shouldn’t have brought you here, you’ve dragged me in and we’ve upset my mum. We should just leave.”

“I can get this just…” and Dirk closed his eyes tightly, willing for a sign.

“Dirk, it’s over,” stated Bobby, who was now at the door again, “let’s go.”

Dirk was unwilling to let it go but he didn’t have any guidance. He had nothing. Whatever inkling had said that Bobby was involved was being overcome by the feeling of guilt and he eventually had to resign to it.

They left the shed and Bobby led the way back across the marshes. Out in the distance, thunder rumbled from some dark clouds. Dirk found himself momentarily distracted by this bad omen.

“Be careful, watch your footing,” said Bobby.

With that prompt Dirk landed his right foot right into a sodden patch of mud and sunk down just under his knee.

“Bollocks!” shouted Dirk, causing Bobby to whirl around and scoff in disbelief.

“Honestly Dirk?”

“Hey I’m now the one with ruined trainers!” said Dirk, and tried to pull his foot out. “…I can’t pull it out. There’s something in the way, my foot’s trapped.”

“What?” said Bobby, returning to Dirk, “what is it?”

“Feels metallic,” said Dirk, jostling his foot and shin around, “dig down and pull it out.”

“I’m not sticking my hands into mud.”

“Well nor am I, I’ll ruin my jacket! Do you know how expensive this jacket is?”

“If I stick my hands down there, I’ll get stuck too, this stuff is like quicksand.”

“Oh really? I hadn’t noticed what with my foot stuck,” stated Dirk, “look my hands are free. I can still pull you out.”

“Look,” said Bobby and gripped round Dirk’s chest under his armpits, “on three?”

On three, he yanked Dirk upward, and Dirk yanked his foot up, and they managed to retrieve Dirk’s foot from the marsh and found Dirk’s soprano note.

“Ah I think something cracked!” shouted Dirk, pulling his mud-sodden trainer off and grasping his foot, before throwing his hands away as he seethed, “ah! I think we broke it!”

“It’s probably sprained,” said Bobby dismissively, but he peered down into the mud to see the edge of a metallic object that had gotten Dirk trapped in the first place.

He stooped down and pulled the box from the mud, revealing it to be some kind of toolbox.

“What is that?” asked Dirk, who’d sat down on one of the least water-logged mounds.

Bobby ignored the question and opened it up cautiously. The toolbox had successfully kept the mud and water out. Inside, he found an envelope. When he considered the envelope he found it had a name written on its front; Lorraine.

“It’s a letter for my mum,” said Bobby, quietly as he wondered what the implications were.

He carefully turned it round and opened it, pulling out the contents. It was two pieces of paper – the first being a handwritten letter.

_Dear Lorraine,_

_If you’re reading this, I can only assume my comeuppance has arrived. If that has happened, you must destroy everything in my shed; the machines, the automatons, the computer, everything must be either burnt or tossed in a scrapyard. No other hands must lay upon them after what has happened. I don’t know who the wrong hands could be but what happened with us I can only imagine what wrongdoing could be achieved._

_I’m sorry. I love you. After the experiments with Henry and Ava, we stumbled upon technology we couldn’t hope to understand the implications of. And after Ava’s death, I think I realise that we too shall suffer the consequence of dabbling in the realm that only god should tread. Henry was inconsolable with guilt, I haven’t been able to speak with him since._

_We dismantled the third computer; it was an emotional reaction. Henry still has the second computer and I hope he will destroy it, but mine I haven’t been able to bring myself to dismantle it yet. So many years of work went into everything. I know it must be done, but I’ve not yet racked up the courage and the acceptance to do it. Henry still has Ava’s record – after her death I said he must destroy it. But he was reluctant and I can understand why._

_All I can think about is how this was likely inevitable, dabbling in the realm of conscience and life. Ava’s death is evidence that we will suffer similar fates in the pursuit of such experiments, and so I fear my time will come eventually. Please know I love you. And I love Bobby. Take care of him and remember me happily. Do not remember me for my involvement in Ava’s death, and in these machines, these abominations of nature. Remember me in fondness. Please. I beg of you._

_And forgive me. Forgive me for what I have wrought._

_Your love,_

_Robert Louis Snr._

Bobby felt his eyes welling up. He looked at Dirk for a glance, who sat there dumbfounded as Bobby read the letter. Bobby then pried the second paper away – it was a type-faced report on fax paper. It read:

_Experiment 38, Edinburgh Zoo – Peter the Parrot_

_Result: Successful Write – Subject Dead_

_Notes: All memories seem to be present after the write. Peter, when let loose, immediately returned to his cage at the zoo. The machine he now inhabits also was fully functional to the point it was indiscernible that he was no longer of flesh and blood. It was noted that the data capacity required to house the record of his brain was approximately 5.8 GB, which doesn’t correlate exactly with the amount of data we estimated was required. I’m glad I set a drive worth 64 GB inside. I’m not sure what compression techniques Ava found but it worked. I have taken to trying to upgrade the other machines to larger drives to accommodate the larger brains but I am limited in my technology. The human automaton I believe, whilst would function, will not be able to house a human brain using this technique and I’ve said this to Ava and Henry. Hence they’ve begun to build a third computer. They’ve also asked I stop being so poetic when writing my reports. I told them to stick it up their-_

Bobby presented the paper to Dirk and then sat down beside him in the dirt. Feelings and realisations crashed over Bobby and he had to try and count to calm himself down.

“Wow, this is a major break in the case!” said Dirk, after he’d read both pieces of paper, “the parrot was a robot! An automaton! Henry must have been working top secret with your father and Ava to build these. And the record, I bet that’s the tape! Maybe they started recording their experiments rather than type them up? Maybe it’s a video recording of Ava’s death! That’s why-“

Dirk stopped as he realised Bobby was whimpering and muttering ‘thousands’ under his breath. Dirk realised this was not the right time and tried stretching a hand to Bobby’s shoulder. “He did say he loved you.”

Bobby sniffed, “I still don’t know what happened but Dirk this is,” tears rolled down Bobby’s cheek, “it is linked! You were right! Something did happen to him, he didn’t abandon us, he-“ and Bobby couldn’t continue.

The relief of knowing his father hadn’t abandoned him was like a weight off his shoulders, something he’d carried his whole life. And it was breaking his heart. He couldn’t stop crying.

It was a full ten minutes before Bobby could control himself to actually construct fully formed sentences. Dirk waited patiently for him, knowing he couldn’t say anything more. When Bobby had recuperated, he wiped his eyes and leant back, “I believe you.”

“Thank you.”

“We need to solve this case.”

“Yes.”

“Alright, let’s get back to the house,” and Bobby stood up, “let me give you a hand.”

Bobby helped bring Dirk to his one good foot, his other foot he held up away from the ground as he held onto his muddy trainer.

“We should show your mum this letter,” said Dirk.

“Not yet,” said Bobby, and he took the letter from Dirk to put in his pocket, “not yet, I don’t think she’d be ready for this. When we have more answers.”

“But she’s been just like you? Worrying about this for years?”

“She hasn’t Dirk. Like I told you, she’s been better at this than me. She accepted he was gone long ago. This wouldn’t help her anymore than she’s helped herself. Trust me.”

Dirk smiled, “okay. I trust you.”

They half hobbled, half hopped back to the garden, and then back into the kitchen where Lorraine was washing up. She presented some homemade apple pie for the two of them and set a new pot of tea at the table as Bobby and Dirk talked – Bobby started talking about his father in even more depth. Eventually Lorraine had to get involved. They talked family outings, the time that Robert Senior had fixed the toaster but it launched the toast so that it hit the ceiling, the time that Robert Junior brought the electronic spider to school and had it confiscated for letting it loose in the girls’ bathroom. They remembered Robert fondly.

Later into the afternoon, Dirk got a phone call and he hopped out into the garden to take it, leaving Bobby with his mum. He could see it was Todd.

“Todd! You’re not going to believe-“

“Dirk! Dirk there’s no time!”

“Wait, Peter was a robot!”

“We know that!”

“Bobby’s father built him! Bobby’s father WAS involved, just like I suspected!”

“What? No look, Dirk you need to listen-“

“And the tape is a video record of Ava’s death, that’s why Jon had it! And maybe why Henry wanted it I-“

“Dirk, Billboard is on fire! There was this woman and she set the building on fire! And… and she shot Missy. Missy is dead. Me and Farah are going to meet with Lewis, he seems to be the only person who can explain any of this, but we think Jon is in danger! Dirk, you need to get to Jon! You need to get to him now!”

When they hung up, Dirk held the phone in his hands. He tried to put some weight on his foot but had to lift it back up. Missy was dead. Missy was dead? Missy was Bobby’s partner right? The one that arrested him?

He took a deep breath. He shouldn’t tell him. Not right now. Not until he had all the answers. It wasn’t a good time.

Was this how Robert or Henry had felt after Ava’s death? Henry sounded like he felt guilt, and Robert had felt it was inevitable. He turned to look into the kitchen from the garden to see Bobby talking with his mother. What more blood would be spilt on this venture? Three people, possibly four had died as part of this case. What if Bobby was next? Was it his fault? Was all this his fault again?

That was always the question, but he had to remember that the actions of others weren’t on his hands. The awful decisions that the people involved weren’t under his control. The only thing he could do was protect the people he could. Try and keep them safe. He needed to get back to Todd and Farah. No, he needed to get back to Jon and Lily.

But what inevitabilities would he be facing; whose leaves were headed for the waterfall? Could he paddle in and stop them floating the wrong way, or would he be carried on his own path with no power? Surely he had some control. But then wouldn’t that mean he had some responsibility in it all; if he could adjust the path of someone’s arrow, was he not responsible for all of their trajectories?

He also noted that he’d inherited Robert’s poetic tone and he’d need to throw that away as soon as possible. It really didn’t help portray the gravity of the situation.


	8. We Didn't Start The Fire

_A younger Helga sat at her desk, typing away at the old computer. She was waiting on a phone call that had been scheduled in her calendar. They were meant to have started five minutes ago, where were they? She didn’t need this, she needed a break. If only Ava was working properly, she wouldn’t be so stressed. The shareholders were really getting on her case. Maybe she needed a break. She and Dave could fly out to Barbados and have a nice relaxing-_

_The door to the office opened. A man looked frantic._

_“Everything’s down,” he said._

_Helga had to readjust her thoughts, “what?”_

_“The server’s offline, everything’s down, the sites aren’t working anymore,” he said._

_“How-“ began Helga, “is it Jon? What did he do?”_

_“We don’t know we’ve not had anyone contact,” said the man, “but Ava’s offline.”_

_“How is it offline, what did he do? He was meant to-“_

_“The engineers are on the way to the data centre right now ma’am,” said the man._

_Helga sighed, “put all sites into maintenance mode. We need everyone on full alert and we have to put something temporary in place,” she said._

_The man nodded and backed out the office. Helga didn’t need this. A full site outage? After all this slowness? She put a head in her hands and looked at the picture of her husband. Things had been so much easier when she was just a department head and not a CEO. Maybe she should quit. Step down._

_That was the annoying thing, she couldn’t step down during a crisis, it would make her look bad. She’d have to wait until it was over and THEN she’d have the chance to step down. And at that point she’d have gotten them through this._

_Responsibility was hard._

_The phone rang. She picked it up._

_“Finally! Jonquil! Where were you?” asked Helga._

_“Sorry, I got caught up in work,” said the voice at the other end, “how’s it going?”_

_“It’s just gotten a little worse,” said Helga, “let me tell you about it.”_

_*_

When Farah finally got out of bed, her phone was ringing. Picking it up, she was surprised at who was on the other end.

“Lewis?”

“Hi Ms Black? Hey, sorry, I hope I didn’t scare you.”

“What happened to you? Where did you go?”

“These guys showed up. It happened really fast. I managed to get out with the computer but I think they’re looking for me. Can we meet up? I think we need to talk, this computer seems really important to some people and we need to work out what to do with it.”

Farah was surprised, “yeah, yeah we can meet. Where?”

“Back at the zoo? After hours? I think the university building is closed what with the investigation. I won’t bring the computer, I’ll keep that safe, we can just talk.”

“Okay. The zoo? Are you sure?”

“They found us there I don’t think they’ll expect us if we’re there a second time.”

“Did they hurt you Lewis?”

“No no! I was able to get out of there.”

“…With the computer?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay Lewis, we’ll meet you there this afternoon.”

“Thanks! Oh boy, this has been a crazy couple of days for me, I really appreciate this. I’ll see you then!”

When Farah hung up, Todd poked his nose into the conversation whilst also pushing a leg through his trousers, “that was Lewis? Is he okay?”

“Yeah he sounds fine,” said Farah, “I think he’s leading us into a trap.”

“What makes you say that?”

“He doesn’t sound right. How did he get out when Alice got killed? And he’s asking us to meet up back at the zoo,” and Farah tossed the phone onto the bed, “do you think we should go?”

Todd shrugged, “trap or not, he has answers. And the computer.”

“He’s not bringing the computer.”

“What else is there to do?”

Farah clicked her tongue, “we should check out Billboard.”

Todd raised an eyebrow, “why? Dirk said they weren’t really involved.”

“I don’t really trust Dirk’s detective skills. Plus I want to know what Jon broke exactly. Maybe they’re the ones behind the murder? They seem like the only people who would have any stake in all this.”

Todd zipped up his fly, “okay Billboard it is,” he began button his shirt, “Dirk said he’s looking into Bobby’s father, the officer that arrested us. He thinks he’s connected. Jon’s at Bobby’s girlfriend’s place and the police are patrolling it to make sure the clothed man doesn’t come back,” he then put his hands on his hips, “and guess where Bobby’s girlfriend lives?”

“The bookshop?”

“No, what? No, the Botanist, the coffee shop! She’s the barista that served us,” said Todd, a confident smile on his face.

“What does she have to do with anything?”

“I guess she’s like Missy, just wrong place wrong time,” said Todd, now tackling his socks of which he had to find as they’d been thrown randomly around the hotel room.

When they got down and out the hotel, they were surprised to see Missy dressed in casual clothes, leant against her car as if she were waiting. When she saw Farah and Todd, she threw her hand up in a wave and they went over to greet her.

“Missy? What are you doing here?” asked Farah, concerned.

“Well they asked me to take some time off. But I couldn’t stop thinking about that girl, Alice. If she was murdered, you guys seem to be the only people who can find the culprit. I couldn’t sit at home without doing anything,” and Missy touched the back of her head, “this is what a police officer is all about right? Justice? I just couldn’t let the culprit get away without giving them a piece of my mind.”

“Missy this is dangerous. We’ve no idea who we’re up against,” said Farah, “I think it’s best you stay home.”

“Hey, as a Special Constable I have expertise! I re-watched Bad Boys 2 last night just to make sure I was prepped,” said Missy.

Todd shrugged, “she does have a car.”

“It’s a quick little guy. You’re gonna have to push down the front seat to get in the back,” and she gestured to her red Ford KA.

Farah wasn’t impressed, but she too relented and got into the passenger side as Todd climbed over the driver’s seat.

“Do you guys like Indie Rock? My Spotify playlist is pretty much just Arctic Monkeys and the Killers,” said Missy, getting into the driver’s seat, “not really suited for the mood, but I’m sure we could find something to get us pumped.”

*

Lewis sighed and then spoke on his earpiece, “alright ma’am, it’s done.”

“Good work Lewis, I think I underestimated you! I’m sending Wung and Abed your way to help you. Make sure they aren’t on our tail, and if they are Wung and Abed can deal with them. Where are you meeting them?”

“The zoo.”

“The zoo?”

“Kind of seemed natural.”

“…They’re still investigating the death of that girl, you’re literally returning to the crime scene.”

“They’re still looking it as a suicide right? How much investigating do they need to do?”

“You’re going to have stalk the building until they leave- alright retract my earlier statement you’re still an idiot.”

“Sorry ma’am.”

“Whatever, just make sure Abed and Wung clean up REAL good afterward. Can I talk to the guy?”

“Now?”

“I need to get these wheels in motion! If you’re right, and this guy is the guy, then I can get the tape with pretty much no issue,” she paused for a second or so, then added, “no more deaths. You want that right?”

“No more deaths. Yeah that sounds good.”

“When we become a fully privatised military force, I expect you’re going to be resigning huh?”

“I can work in tech.”

“You want to work for a company that’s going to do a lot more killing Lewis. You aren’t gonna want that. It’s fine, I’ll put you up with a nice retirement fund. Now put me on with the guy.”

Lewis knew Jonquil was right. How did he get caught up in all this mess? This was not the career path he had expected to be on. When he had majored in IT he expected he could work in a nice little tech job. That was his fault for joining a company for the money and not looking into what they did. Of course, it’s not as if the website told him the CEO was a cold-blooded murderer. That wouldn’t have been a good advertising tactic.

Or maybe it would be – it would get people interested. Plus, she wasn’t cold-blooded, just logical. Calculated. Clever! Damn, these strong independent women, they’d be the death of him.

He trotted up to the clothed man, “hey my boss wants to talk to you,” he said, “you can grab the earpiece from inside my ear.”

The clothed man considered Lewis for a moment before bending down and fiddling about in Lewis’ ear for the earpiece. When he found it, he lifted it away from his head so he could hear but he didn’t have to put it in his own ear.

Oh yeah, and now Lewis was a dog. That was great. It didn’t feel good, there were patches in his memory and he couldn’t think too straight. It felt like he could think faster but there was just a lot missing. Nothing obvious until he tried to do some simple recall like, what was the girl’s name in the zoo? What was his mother’s maiden name? What did Farah look like? And what did ketchup taste like, did it taste good? He also seemed to have lost all his small-talk skills. Not essentially useful, being a dog and all, but if he did manage to find someone who wasn’t scared to death of a talking dog, how was that going to pan out? Maybe he’d need to find a book on it or something.

The clothed man considered the earpiece and then began, “hello?”

“Hi, is this the clothed man?”

“Is that what they call me?”

“Well we don’t really know who you are so it’ll suffice.”

“My name is Henry.”

“Great, not that important. Look, we’ve got the same goal here and I want to give you a hand. I want to help you help me. I want the tape. You want the tape. If you get the tape, I can help you get back into your original body. I’ve got the first computer.”

“You have Robert’s computer?”

“I’ve had it for a while! We’ve not been able to use it since, but now we have the second computer we’ve been really putting it through its paces!”

“You’re insane, it’s not built for this,” said Henry, gesturing to Lewis which Jonquil obviously couldn’t see.

“It’s working! Look, that’s not important. I know where Jon is and I can’t really touch him. There’s a patrol but I can help you avoid them, as long as you we agree that when you get the tape that you give it to me.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because I’m on my way to secure the data centre. So you give me the tape, I boot it up, and we can resolve everything. Even revert good ole Lewis down there.”

“That won’t work,” said Henry, “it doesn’t work like that. Do you even understand the technology?”

“Oh, but come on. Harry was it? That’s what you want, it’s what I want. Lewis can’t be a dog forever, you can’t be a robot forever. Especially as Robert is gone.”

“You killed Robert?”

“I never said that. Look, I’m going to give you Jon’s location. You go over there and get the tape and we’ll go from there. If you decide to double-cross me, I will retaliate, and I think you know that. But we can cross that bridge when we get to it! Help me help you, help me help you!”

Henry leant on his walking stick, contemplating it, “alright fine. Where is he?”

“A town called Livingston, you know it? A place called the Botanist.”

Henry tensed, “the Botanist?”

“You want the location?”

“That’s alright,” said Henry, his voice growing quieter, “I know exactly where that is.”

*

Missy parked up outside Billboard’s headquarters. Todd again had to wrestle his way out of the car after Farah and Missy had stepped out. Farah looked at Missy, she looked like she was trembling.

“Are you alright?” asked Farah.

Missy realised Farah was watching her, “yeah I’m fine. Just a bit nervous.”

“Do you have any weapons?”

“No, do you think we’ll need one?” asked Missy.

Farah shrugged, “couldn’t help. I’ve never been so long without a firearm.”

“Man, America is nuts,” said Missy, “is it weird living somewhere where you can just find guns anywhere?”

“They’re not on display in shop windows!” to which Farah then stopped herself, “well they are but it’s not that easy to get one.”

“If it isn’t guns, it’s knives. If it isn’t knives, it’s forks.”

“Forks?”

“I once heard of a kid who had stabbed in the eye with a fork,” said Missy, “I wasn’t there but it sounded gruesome. It might have been a rumour.”

They entered the building and the receptionist from yesterday was there. They looked up pleasantly as they approached and gave a nonchalant, “hi there.”

Missy fished in her pocket nervously before pulling out her badge, “we’re with the police. Do you mind if we go up to Billboard?”

The receptionist smiled, “sure I just need a record of your visit. I’ll let them know you’re here.”

“Yeah that’s fine,” said Missy and she signed the logbook and took some passes.

Then they entered the elevator to head up to Billboard. On the way, Todd was looking around impressed. “They’ve got nice elevators,” he stated, which got a look from Farah.

In the office it looked empty. It was a Saturday so they didn’t expect anyone to be working. Nonetheless, in the Billboard reception area they were approached by a woman who looked to be in her forties. She had a look of worry upon her face.

“Hi, you’re the police officer?” she asked, “I’m Helga. Helga Whittacker.”

“Hi,” said Missy shaking her hand, “do you mind if we talk? We have some questions.”

Helga bit her lip but showed them through the office. The computers were all on standby, and there was an eerie silence in the office. It was strange to see a place that was dedicated to work completely empty; it seemed that for a company to run you needed people on hand 24/7, but when it came down to it things could run headless. And it was an odd thought to think of a company existing without the people there to work. As if the company was a separate entity.

Helga lead them into her own office where she sat down. Todd had to bring in a swivel chair so he could sit down as well. Helga looked tired and when she sat down the weight of what was on her mind caused her to lean back, letting the chair support the heavy head.

“How can I help?” asked Helga finally, her voice shrill but quiet, as if she’d stopped trying to yell at the students in her class and realised that they were going to march out her classroom with the chairs in their hands so they could stack them outside and there was nothing she could do.

Farah took the lead, “we know about Ava.”

Helga sighed, “I’ll tell you what I told Henry; Jon has the tape.”

Todd leant forward, and felt his chair swing, “Henry was here?”

“Yes, about a year ago.”

“Was he clothed? As in, dressed in a lot of clothes?” asked Todd.

“Yes, and he spoke as if he was talking through a phone,” said Helga.

Todd leant back in victory, “I knew it, the clothed man IS Henry.”

“Okay, what does Ava have to do with the zoo?” asked Farah.

“The zoo?”

“The computer at the zoo? What was Henry doing?” asked Farah.

“Look all I know is he was helping Ava develop artificial intelligence, back when we were Octagon,” admitted Helga.

“Where is she now?”

“She’s dead,” said Helga and she looked confused, “wait how much do you guys really know?”

“How about you tell us what you know and we’ll just correlate,” said Farah.

“Before the company split, and I was head of the Artificial Intelligence department, Ava was working for me. She asked for funding to assist Henry in his research,” said Helga, “and after she died, Henry gave me the tape.”

“What does the tape do?” asked Farah, “why is it so important?”

“It’s crucial to the supercomputer, for Ava,” and Helga had to shake her head to rearrange her thoughts, “there are two Avas. You know this right?”

Farah, Missy and Todd exchanged looks, before Todd stepped in, “there are two Avas?”

“You don’t know,” said Helga in realisation, “who are you guys?”

“Friends of Jon; he hired us when Henry attacked him,” explained Farah, “we were meant to identify him. Did you send Henry?”

“No, I don’t control Henry. Why do you want Ava?”

“We don’t,” said Todd, “we’re just trying to keep Jon safe.”

“Is there anyone else who wants Ava?” asked Farah, “that knew about Henry?”

The phone on Helga’s desk started to ring, but she ignored it for a moment, “look, I’d say drop it. You don’t want to be involved. If you have the tape, keep it safe. I would say I want it back but I think it’s too late for us here,” she grunted, as if she didn’t want to admit what she was saying, “we’re not going to come back from our recent losses. Whatever Jon wants to do with the tape, it’s his now, we can’t-” the phone was still ringing and so Helga held up a finger so she could answer it.

After she listened to the other end, her face turned pale and she gave a frightened look to the three of them. When she finally hung up with the words, “send her up,” she leant forward and stood up quickly, “you need to leave, immediately.”

Farah stood up, “wait we still have questions!”

“There’s no time,” said Helga, “you can take the fire escape round the back, but you need to leave else you’re in danger.”

“What’s happening? Who’s coming?” asked Farah, “we need answers else we’re in danger anyway.”

Helga’s eyes flickered to her office door, before she gave up, “just wait here then. Don’t come out, she can’t know you’re here.”

She left the office and shut the door. The three of them were left alone and Todd jumped up with a smile on his face, “I knew it was Henry.”

“So Henry wants the tape,” said Farah, “for the supercomputer Ava, not the human Ava.”

“But we still don’t know who killed Alice and took Henry’s computer, or what the computer even does,” said Missy, “it’s like two different lines and they don’t seem to join anywhere.”

“Maybe the computer was like early days Ava,” said Todd.

“Someone else wants Ava,” said Farah, “someone more dangerous than Henry. I bet that who’s here,” said Farah, “edge the door open.”

Todd did as directed and cracked open the door so they could hear what was happening outside.

Outside in the main office, Helga approached a blonde woman in a black uniform; Jonquil. She had two plastic jugs in her hands but put them on the floor when Helga approached her.

“Helga! I didn’t actually expect anyone to be here, look at you! You trooper!” said Jonquil, who brandished her arms as if going for a hug.

“What are you doing here Jonquil?” asked Helga.

“Well like I say I didn’t expect you to be here,” said Jonquil, pouting a little, “man it’s been so long! We should get a coffee or something. We haven’t gone for a workout in ages! I can see you’ve dropped off the machine, have you been keeping up with your exercises? I think I’ve got a resting heart rate of 42 right now, look!” Jonquil brandished her smart watch to which Helga brushed off.

“We’re not friends anymore Jonquil.”

“Aw, why not? I get that we had our differences, but we used to be a power couple! Remember?” Jonquil pulled out her water bottle and took a few gulps, “ugh, I tell you what the water round here is gross. If I could just stop and get some bottled water it’d be much better.”

Helga scoffed, her arms folded, “stop stalling.”

“Oh, come on Helga. Did I tell you, I’ve had a good few productive days! I’m getting the tape back today, isn’t that great?”

Helga raised an eyebrow, “you found the tape?”

“I sure did,” said Jonquil giddily, “and when I get it, I can boot Ava up and all this will be over!”

“It’s too late Jonquil, this company’s going bust, I can’t-“

“Oh wait, wait, no I didn’t mean for you! No, I’m not giving you the tape,” said Jonquil, wagging her finger.

Helga frowned, “what?”

“No, I’m keeping the tape. Yeah, I’ve even got some guys down to your data centre in Livingston to secure the servers. Can’t have it all left up to chance now,” chuckled Jonquil, “oh, I can’t wait to get that AI of yours online. Imagine the implications! The most powerful tactician in history. We’re going to clone it and sell it globally to military divisions all over! Imagine that, war will be turned on its head when we have AIs running the show. The power of fast processing, and yet the creativity of tactics will be an amazing mesh of pure strength! It’s going to be awesome!” Jonquil took another swig.

“You can’t do this!”

“Oh, but I can. That’s why I’m here actually, seeing as your company is kind of in the way I thought I’d just deal with it now,” Jonquil kicked the plastic jug, “I’m gonna burn this place down. Too much information here, you know? But you can keep the insurance money! Create a new company, you’ll get back on your feet in no time! It’s a win-win scenario.”

“I’m not letting you burn down my company!” said Helga, attempting to put her foot down.

“See this is one of those differences. This is why you went with Billboard and I kept Octagon as a proper force of reckoning. Back when we were a military organisation, things got done! If only we had the AI back then, we could have avoided this awkward twenty0year gap where you meddled with… what adverts and translations? And I’ve had to struggle along as a security firm. Now it’s all coming together,” and Jonquil interlocked her fingers, “I’m gonna get the tape, I’ve got the computer-“

Helga lifted a hand, “Henry’s computer? Were you involved in what happened at the zoo?”

Jonquil gave a defeated sigh, “I never said that. Look, relax Helga, I’m giving you an out! You’re my friend!”

“We’re not friends Jonquil, you kill people. How can I be friends with you knowing that?” Helga returned to crossing her arms, “I can call the police.”

Jonquil tilted her head, “you won’t. Because then you’d have to explain about Ava. And I know you can’t do that. It’s mutually assured destruction. This is why we work so well together,” and Jonquil offered her a smile, “look come on! I’ll buy you a coffee!”

“A coffee for burning down my office.”

“When you put it like that… yeah!” Jonquil laughed.

Helga shook her head, “I can’t believe you.”

Jonquil had a sympathetic look her face, “I remember when we used to go for runs, and you’d talk about your husband, and I’d tell you about these guys trying to buy me flowers. Back when I thought I was straight, remember that? Man ,the nineties were crazy! So many conflicting emotions and feelings, I gotta say things have only just gotten more complicated what with all these labels and stuff. I can’t get my head round it most of the time.”

“I’m leaving Jonquil, you do what you want,” said Helga dismissively.

“Okay, okay,” said Jonquil, realising their conversation was done, “hey you haven’t got anyone else up here do you?”

Helga had to stop, “no it’s just me. Why?”

“I’m burning the place down, I don’t WANT to kill anyone,” said Jonquil, “also I saw someone signed in. Some Missy Brown?”

Missy cursed under her breath and Farah and Todd locked eyes with her.

Helga clenched her fists, “no she left.”

“Alright, I’d better just check. Can’t have some civilian caught up in all this, it would make this more difficult,” said Jonquil.

Missy pressed her back against the office wall. She cursed again.

Farah and Todd watched her, but Missy looked like she was reaching into her pocket with a shaking hand. Farah shook her head slowly, but Missy looked her dead in the eye.

“I got this. Good luck,” she mouthed and then stepped out of the office, brandishing her badge.

“You! You’re under civilian’s arrest!” shouted Missy, her voice half getting caught in her throat, and she stepped out into the room, seeing Jonquil fully in the flesh for the first time.

Jonquil raised her eyebrows, “oh, did you hear all that?“ she turned to Helga, “she was here the whole time?”

Helga was speechless and remained where she was stood. Jonquil considered Missy and looked her up and down.

“You are under arrest for suspicion of the murder of Alice O’Connor,” stated Missy, “and perhaps more people. If you did.”

Jonquil gave an annoyed grunt, “Jesus, I said I didn’t want any civilian casualties,” she gave Missy a frustrated look, “who are you?”

“Officer Brown,” said Missy, “put down the… jugs.”

“Officer? You’re not in uniform, are you off-duty?”

“I’m a special constable,” said Missy.

Jonquil rolled her eyes, “then you’ve got no power! Lord, you don’t really get this do you. What did you expect would happen here, that I’d give up to you?” she laughed, “okay, what do you know?”

“Enough,” stated Missy, her voice wavering.

“Sucks,” said Jonquil, “told you Helga. Again, this is a situation where I’m the one doing what needs to be done. This is exactly like the tape! You didn’t want to get the authorities involved, so you told me. It’s like, you can’t make the decisions yourself so you just leave it down to me to make them. Because you know what needs to be done, but you can’t do it!”

She pulled out her gun and fired directly at Missy’s head. Missy fell back and lay onto the floor, her limbs splayed.

“Kind of good timing, I get to burn her with all this,” said Jonquil, “but see? Am I the bad guy here? I just make a decision no one else wants to,” and she shook her head.

Helga didn’t say anything. Her eyes were glued to Missy’s body.

“Yeah, it’s not nice,” said Jonquil, “eurgh,” and she started to drain the jugs she had brought around the office, “alright well if you don’t want coffee you might as well leave now. This place is going down. And I have to go get the tape after this. I’ll give you enough credence so they can’t hold you accountable for the fire.”

Helga hesitated, but then she turned and left. Jonquil continued dowsing the tables and computers in fluid and tossed some over Missy’s corpse. She then took out a lighter and lit it, but crouched down by Missy’s body.

“Sorry love,” she said, quietly, “wrong place, wrong time kind of thing here. I admire the courage. You might’ve been a good employee! Better than some of the guys. God I wish I had you rather than Lewis. Probably would’ve been better if your positions were switched,” and then she stood up and dropped the lighter.

The fire started immediately, sweeping around the office, causing Jonquil to jump. “Goddam that was quick! Okay! Time to get that tape!”

She then ran for the office entrance to get out quickly before the fire alarm was triggered. When the elevator sounded to indicate it was moving, Farah and Todd emerged from Helga’s office. Farah tried to reach Missy’s body but the fire was consuming it and the carpet around it.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” said Todd, tugging her arm and leading her towards the fire exit signs.

Farah did so and they made their way into the fire escape stairwell. By the time they made it, the fire alarms had begun blaring. They didn’t have far to go down, being only a few floors above reception. When they got to the bottom, Farah had to take a moment, and Todd also leant up against the wall.

Todd broke the silence saying, “so Lewis is definitely a trap.”

Farah nodded, “he’s working for that woman.”

“Do we still meet him?”

“Do we have a choice?”

“We have to help Jon, she’s on her way there.”

“We won’t make it, she’s got a head start. Phone Jon and warn him.”

Todd brought up his phone, “do you have his number?”

Farah shook her head.

“Shit, only Dirk has it,” said Todd, “alright I’ll phone Dirk then. He’s got to get back to him.”

He waited on the line for Dirk to pick up.

“Todd! You’re not going to believe-“

“Dirk! Dirk there’s no time!”

“Wait, Peter was a robot!”

“We know that!”

“Bobby’s father built him! Bobby’s father WAS involved, just like I suspected!”

“What? No look, Dirk you need to listen-“

“And the tape is a video record of Ava’s death, that’s why Jon had it! And maybe why Henry wanted it I-“

“Dirk, Billboard is on fire! There was this woman and she set the building on fire! And… and she shot Missy. Missy is dead. Me and Farah are going to meet with Lewis, he seems to be the only person who can explain any of this, but we think Jon is in danger! Dirk, you need to get to Jon! You need to get to him now!”

When he got off the phone he remained against the wall. Farah was crying now. She was slowly falling to the ground, bracing herself against the wall.

“I told her,” she said, “I told her it was dangerous.”

Todd got down to the floor and put an arm around her, “we can’t stay the fire’s still going.”

Farah nodded, still crying and they got out the stairwell and made it out into an area out the back of the building where the bins were. Smoke was started to pour out of the windows above them. People were also gathering out into the area, various employees including the receptionist who had a high-vis jacket, ticking off names. They avoided the commotion and got out onto the street.

Eventually Farah had to stop on the curb, sitting down and burying her face into her hands. Todd sat beside her. It wasn’t that he wasn’t upset, but he couldn’t seem to cry about it. It happened so fast, it hadn’t set in. Plus, he’d not really known Missy well, she had just been a puppet in their play. Her exit cue had come.

But Farah continued to cry, not being able to stop herself. They’d led Missy to her death, she knew it. If she’d just stayed at home this would never have happened. And yet, if Missy hadn’t had done what she did, would Jonquil have killed them instead? Did Missy just save their lives?

“I think Missy saved our lives,” said Todd, as if reading her mind, “that woman would totally have killed us right if she had found us?” he clasped his hands together, “we have to stop her. Somehow.”

“I’m gonna kill her,” said Farah, “even if I don’t have a gun, I’ll strangle her with my bare hands. She had no remorse, she just killed her! As if she were a nuisance? Who thinks of people like that…” she stood up and kicked a streetlamp beside them. And then kicked it again. She kicked it a few times to be sure, until Todd grabbed her by the shoulders and embraced her into a hug.

“I’ll kill her,” she whimpered, “and I’m gonna beat the shit out of Lewis. He’s been against us the whole time.”

“Maybe we should leave it,” said Todd, “if it’s a trap then-“

“Of course it’s a trap, but god dammit Todd I’m gonna kick that guy’s face in! It’s his fault that two people are dead! I’m not going to let anyone else die if I can help it. I’m gonna find a gun, somewhere, somehow, and I’m going to do it.”

“Alright.”

“Alright?”

“Alright,” said Todd, stroking her head through her hair, “alright.”


	9. Animal Farm

_Henry woke up. At least, he thought he woke up. It was a strange feeling, he didn’t feel exhausted, he didn’t feel hungry or thirsty. His eyes were open. And they didn’t seem to want to close. And everything was lagging. What had happened? He couldn’t remember anything that had happened prior. When did he fall asleep?_

_He found the strength to move his leg, but it felt heavy and stuck. He strained to see what was in front of him but his eyes were sluggish and wouldn’t focus quickly. A strange whirring was in his head, as if bees were buzzing in his ears. He couldn’t smell. He couldn’t taste. Something was wrong._

_He was in a dark room, it was hard to adjust to the lighting. There were figures around him, some large, some small. They weren’t moving, they were stationary. Oddly stationary._

_Was he having a nightmare? None of this felt real._

_Henry took another step and began to get used to the heavy feeling in his legs. His arms also felt heavy when he lifted them, but he placed a hand on the figures to help cautiously tread to a scrap of light. It was a door frame, the light barely streaming through the cracks between the door and the frame. When he reached the door, he fumbled for a handle. And when his fingers clasped it, he couldn’t feel the texture, he could only feel the pressure and the resistance from the handle as he fingers wrapped around it._

_He turned the handle and eased the door open, finding himself in a hallway with a high ceiling and lightbulbs hanging in what looked like corrugated iron rafters. It was like a storage facility, and he had been in a container, but this was privately owned rather than owned by multiple people. Why was he here?_

_He ambled down the hallway, his footsteps thumping down hard, looking for someone who could help him. Take him to a hospital. Maybe he’d suffered a bump to the head. What had happened before he woke up?_

_At the end of the hallways was another door with bars to push open. Henry outstretched his arms to push and exit. But when he looked down at his hands, unimpeded by darkness, they were not his hands. They were mechanical. Metallic digits with shining silver tendons, to tiny motors embedded in his wrists. And his wrists were metal too. And his forearms, now poles with what looked like a hydraulic pistons inside, connecting to his elbow. His waist was rubber protected, his legs were like his arms, he hadn’t an ounce of his original flesh on him._

_He began to panic, his voice beginning to garble and wail, but it came out compressed as if it were a recording on a cell phone. He cried out and stepped backwards, watching his new metal legs and feet clanging against the ground. He was panicking, he was on the verge of a full breakdown. It had to be a nightmare, there was no way this was real._

_He thrust himself through the double doors, out into the night outside the facility. The door set off an alarm that rattled around his mind, but he ignored it and launched into a run. He ran across a car park, there were lampposts lighting the spaces, and a fence around the area. It was a facility of some kind, but he didn’t recognise it. It wasn’t like those dreams where the unfamiliar areas you always seem to recognise, this was completely new. He ran across it, he aimed for the barrier with the guard’s box, where a security guard was already getting out of his chair to inspect what the alarm was._

_Henry ran at them and began to start crying out, “help me! Help me!”_

_The security guard eventually noticed Henry running at them, but seeing the monstrosity tearing at them they were in no way ready for diplomacy. They pulled out a radio and ran back into the barrier’s booth. Henry reached the box and placed his hands up at the glass, looking inside, trying to get his damn eyes to focus. He could see the security guard but they were in the corner of the box, as far away from the window as they could get._

_“Help! Help, what happened to me!?” asked Henry._

_“Get away!” cried the security guard, “get back!”_

_Henry stepped away from the window and realised just what the security guard must see. What had he become, this mechanical man? He considered his hands and rotated them to look at the backs. He looked back at the security guard. He wanted to wake up now._

_He tore away, running down the road away from the facility. The security guard was left with a pale face and his breath caught in his throat. He coughed to launch it out and got back on the radio._

_“Yeah, it’s gone! I don’t know what it was. Was it one of the things we got from the Louis place? Just what the hell did we bring out here?”_

_*_

Henry heard a rumble in the distance. It would rain soon. He stood in one of the best spots to see the front of the Botanist and the patrol car without being seen himself. As the woman had told him, she’d take care of the patrol, and then he could talk to Jon. He could explain the predicament and get that tape.

He considered double-crossing Jonquil; he didn’t know who she was or how she knew about the tape, but the fact she wanted it was not a good thing. Nobody knew about that tape. Only him, Robert, and Helga. And so only they knew what it did. He could probably have resisted her if he hadn’t had damaged his leg. Now his only weapon was talking and talking about what he knew.

Henry waited and the patrol car switched its route and began driving down the road away from the Botanist. This was his cue, Henry thought. He readied himself, waited until the car was out of sight, and then carefully limped with his stick across the road and to the Botanist.

He rounded the building to the back, aiming for the door for the apartment. At the door he knocked as gently as he could and stepped back, ready for Lily to answer. He didn’t know what he’d say. How would she react? What would Jon say?

The door opened a crack for Lily to peek through and seeing it was a man dressed in clothes that covered his entire body she slammed it shut.

Yeah Henry should have expected that. He knocked again, as gently as he did the first time; he couldn’t exacerbate the situation. He could hear the quick gallop as Lily ran back to her apartment.

In the apartment, Lily burst into her lounge and grabbed Jon by the shoulders, who was still sleeping on her sofa. She shook him awake, not ferociously, but not gently either. Jon drearily opened his eyes and became accustomed to what he was seeing.

“What’s…” he sleepily started, “what’s happening?”

Lily frantically signed, “(There’s a clothed man outside! He got past the patrol!)

Jon understood what she had said and he lifted himself up, “is he inside?”

He heard the gentle rapping on the front door, echoing up the staircase to the apartment. Lily gave him a frightened look. Jon only looked confused.

“If this guy wants to kill me, why is he knocking?” he asked.

“(We have to get out,)” signed Lily and she pressed a hand to her mouth, “(we can go through the shop.)”

“Where do we go?”

“(The police? They have to be out there still.)”

“Maybe he’s killed the police,” said Jon.

Lily placed her hands across her mouth in realisation that she was possibly dealing with a crazed murderer. She shook her head in panic and fear, reaching the kitchen and stifling the sobs that were trying to breach her mouth.

Jon got up from the sofa and ran a hand through his hair, just as another knock echoed from the front door. He tensed his muscles and resolved that he needed to face this head on. No more hiding. He had put Lily in danger in her own home, and he wasn’t going to allow this clothed man to bully his way into his life anymore.

“I’ll be back,” said Jon to Lily, who only watched him as he descended the staircase down to the back door.

He opened it slowly so he could see and finally confront the clothed man.

They looked more hunched over than back in the police station, and the walking stick painted him as more vulnerable. He seemed less scary like this.

Well, until the clothed man reached for his face mask and pulled it away, and dropped the goggles to the ground, displaying a metallic skull-like face, strange camera lens eyes, no nose, and a strip of speaker foam where his mouth should be. It was like the cybermen from Doctor Who. Two holes and a strip for a mouth. The same face you saw as a kid when looking at a VHS tape.

They didn’t move forward after that.

“I’m sorry,” said the clothed man, the compressed audio barely legible.

Jon folded his arms, “sorry for breaking into my home, or sorry for the police station?”

The clothed man, now more the metallic man, tilted his head, “that was my bookshop.”

“Yours?”

“Used to be.”

“It had been abandoned for years.”

“When you don’t need to sleep, drink or eat, the idea of a home became irrelevant,” said the clothed man.

Jon braced himself, “Ava is dead. She’s been dead twenty years.”

The clothed man lowered his head, “I know, I’m sorry. I need the tape.”

Jon shook his head, “I don’t have it.”

The clothed man clenched his fists, “Helga told me you had it.”

“Not anymore.”

“I can fix this, if you just give it to me.”

“Fix what? You won’t bring my wife back, you’re trying to bring online some AI for what exactly…”

“Fix me!” and the volume incremented on the clothed man’s speakers.

Jon stepped back in surprised, causing the clothed man to place a hand in the door frame, in case Jon wanted to close the door. With the change in stance, Jon was backing away slowly, back up the stairs, and the clothed man followed, but at a distance.

“Please,” continued the clothed man, “I’ve been stuck like this for years, and I want to go back. I can’t go on like this machine anymore.”

“Why are you a machine in the first place?” asked Jon, reaching the landing for the apartment.

“It was a mistake, I didn’t know that the first computer was online. When I tried to end things, they must’ve been testing it.”

“Who is they?”

“I don’t know, but they had the first computer, Robert’s computer, and all his machines,” said the clothed man, “it doesn’t matter, because I don’t trust them. I just want the tape for myself, please.”

Jon was now in the apartment, in the lounge, and he found a spot beyond the sofa, letting the clothed man place himself in the middle of the room, and allowing him to stop blockading the only exit. Jon gave a look to Lily, who was watching, frightened from the kitchen.

The clothed man noticed this, and looked to Lily, “I’m sorry Lily. I’m so sorry. You may never forgive me, I understand. But you found Jon. And I can fix this one thing,” he tried to plead.

“Who are you?” asked Jon.

“I am Henry Miller,” said the clothed man, “I worked with your wife. I was there when she died.”

Jon couldn’t help but feel pained when he said this, “you saw it.”

“I did. It was an accident, it wasn’t meant to happen that way. We knew that testing on a human subject was risky but Ava was adamant…”

“How could you let her!?” yelled Jon, “how could you let her do that?”

The clothed man raised his hands in defeat, “I couldn’t tell you. We were overconfident. We were confident the third computer would work,” he then raised a finger, “I destroyed the computer right away. And the tape, I kept the tape. I knew it was the only way-”

“Yeah speaking of the tape,” came another voice from the apartment’s door, whose owner strode inside, a smile across her face, “do we have it yet?”

Jon glanced to the blonde woman who’d now invaded the apartment, “who’s this?”

The clothed man turned to see her, “why are you here? I was meant to get the tape.”

“Yeah but I didn’t trust you,” said Jonquil, who leant on her hip nonchalantly, “and I’m sure you didn’t trust me. Come on, whilst Jon was being watched by the police I couldn’t touch him! Now I’ve got a reason.”

She lifted her radio off her shoulder, “hey guys, fugitive has been found in the apartment. I’ve got eyes on him.”

The clothed man turned around to fully face Jonquil, “you set me up?”

“Yeah, well, when you’re out of the picture then the police aren’t going to be bothered anymore. I then I can do what I like without their eyes on me,” Jonquil stated.

“Out of the picture?” asked Henry.

“Yeah well you’ve done what I needed you to do,” said Jonquil, lifting the gun from her holster and firing several shots at the clothed man’s head.

The clothed man recoiled at two, but the third embedded into his eye and the metallic man lost all function. He fell back with such weight it sounded as if he’d break through the floor. The crash was monumental. Seeing such a man taken out by a gun, Jon was speechless. His eyes didn’t move from the clothed man.

“Alright! Now that’s over with, I had a little time before the back-up arrives,” said Jonquil, “so yeah, where were we with the tape?”

Jon didn’t say anything, he remained still. Lily also was backed in the corner of the kitchen, her hands pressed behind her.

Jonquil laughed, “come on Jon, don’t be scared! I’m not going to kill you, you have the tape! Chuck it to me and we can move on.”

Jon stuttered, “I don’t have it.”

Jonquil’s face soured, “well then where is it?”

Jon couldn’t say. He didn’t want to put Dirk into danger. He hesitated, but his mouth remained closed, and Jonquil took that as a sign that he wasn’t going to talk.

“Jon, I’ve come too far to finish up back at square one. You know where the tape is, of COURSE you know where it is, and if you don’t give it to me then…” Jonquil looked around the room, “well the police aren’t going to be protecting you much longer now that Harry is taken care of.”

Jon shook his head, “someone like you should have it.”

“Uh huh,” said Jonquil, ignoring Jon’s attempt at ethical reasoning. Jonquil looked around, seeing if she could spot a good hiding spot. Then she finally noticed Lily, “oh hi! Who’s this? She’s lovely.”

Jon quickly glanced to Lily and rummaged in his head, “nobody, she’s not important.”

“No?” asked Jonquil, “okay, could you come over here?” she asked Lily, who didn’t move straight away, “look, I’m not going to kill you! I’ve been saying that a lot today, this is a new chapter in my life.” When Lily still didn’t move, Jonquil slumped her shoulders, “fine,” and she pulled out her water bottle, swigging from it, “in the last two days, my exercise regime has been hitting new highs. I’ve been running around so much today!” she noticed her water bottle was low, so putting her gun away and holding her hands in the air non-threateningly, she went to the kitchen.

Jon watched her eagerly, “why do you want the tape?”

“Sorry, this is really not the time or place for the ‘explain my evil plan’ trope. Although it’s not evil,” Jonquil filled her water bottle at the sink, “it’s just good business, right? I work in security, and before it was military technology. That AI is like gold. Did you see the work it did for Billboard?”

Jon clenched his fists, “you’re not going to use it like that.”

“No, I’m gonna use it for military tactics,” said Jonquil, swigging from the bottle and then making a face, “why is the water awful in Livingston?”

Jon didn’t answer her, “how much are you involved?”

“Enough,” said Jonquil, “okay so here’s an idea. This girl isn’t important right?” and she gestured to Lily.

Jon didn’t shake his head nor nod, and Lily remained motionless, scared to accidentally set off this woman in her home.

“…Okay well regardless, I’ll have the boys take her in. We’ll go over to the data centre. And then you can go get the tape, wherever it is, and we can have a little exchange! You remember the data centre? Where you took the tape in the first place?”

Jon raised a hand, “you dare not lay a finger on her!”

Jonquil raised her hands, “oh I won’t. So, say you have until nine to bring me the tape. And if not, this nobody will have an accident. Or multiple accidents!” Jonquil smiled a little pleased, “you see killing people is only good for keeping secrets. A human brain that’s dead, you can’t get that information out again. But otherwise, it’s a hassle and I hate doing it. Keeping someone alive is far more easier. Give them some food, scare them a little, and they take care of themselves. This makes my life easier too because I don’t have to kill her AND I get what I want in the end! Man, hostage situations are just like the best of both worlds.”

The apartment was entered by two police officers, who were brandishing truncheons. Jonquil hailed them and waved them in, “fugitive is down, I took care of him. But I need this girl taken in, I want to ask her some questions.”

One of the police officers inspected the clothed man and the other approached Jonquil, “alright, we’ll take her to the station.”

“That’s fine, you guys take that guy, secure him, I’ll take the girl. I need to get back to the station to file the paperwork anyway,” said Jonquil.

“Wait, she’s lying! She’s working against me!” shouted Jon.

Lily also gave frantic looks but she knew anything she signed no one would understand.

“It’s okay sir,” said the police officer.

“I think he’s been traumatised, make him a cup of tea will you?” said Jonquil, gesturing for Lily to walk in front of her.

“Wait you don’t understand! Stop her!” shouted Jon, pointing at Jonquil, but the police officer had a hand on his shoulder and was pushing him to sit down. Jonquil gave him a quick smirk and then left with Lily walking shakily in front.

“It’s alright sir, we’ve got this under control,” he pulled up his radio, “Officer Louis? Can you come to the Botanist? The fugitive is neutralised and we need you to be with the civilian.”

*

When Bobby and Dirk arrived, it was raining. They sprang into the apartment as fast as they could, or at least Bobby did. Dirk lagged behind, dragging his sprained ankle.

In the apartment, Jon was sat on the sofa with the police officer who Bobby then took over for. When Jon saw that Bobby had arrived, he jumped up from the sofa, “is Dirk here!?”

Dirk at that, ambled in, “is everything alright?”

“Where’s Lily?” asked Bobby, looking around.

“Dirk!” said Jon, and gripped Dirk by the shoulders, who yelped at little at how tightly he was gripping him, “Dirk, where’s the tape.”

“The tape?”

“The VHS tape! The one you took from my bookshop!” said Jon.

“You knew I had the tape!?”

“I saw you had taken it as soon as you had left!”

“Why did you let me take it?” asked Dirk.

Jon sighed, “I don’t know. I felt I could trust you. But I knew I had to stay close, now where is it?”

Dirk stuttered, “I don’t have it.”

“Don’t lie to me now! I can see the square imprint in your jacket!”

Dirk groaned, “right, it is a thin jacket…”

“So give me the tape!”

“Okay but here’s the thing,” and Dirk reached into his jacket and pulled out the self-help book on small talk, “I really don’t have it.”

Jon’s face went white, “what? Where is it?”

“I gave it to Todd.”

“When!?”

“At the hotel before we got arrested! They said they thought you knew I had it, so-“

“Are you fucking kidding me!?” shouted Jon, and whirled around on his feet.

The other officer looked like he was about to get involved, but Bobby put a hand on the officer and said that he’d take care of it. The officer left and Bobby spoke to Jon to try and calm him down.

“What happened?” asked Bobby, “where’s Lily?”

“She took her!” said Jon, “that woman! I don’t know who she is, but she wanted the tape, and she won’t give us Lily unless we give her the tape.”

Dirk’s heart sank. Bobby’s eyes searched Jon’s face for some indication he was lying before he stepped back and began cursing to himself. He wasn’t going to be able to calm himself down from this. He stood with his hands on his hips, looking at the ceiling, thinking what on earth all this meant.

“I should never have brought you here,” he moaned to himself.

“I’ll call Todd, we’ll get the tape,” said Dirk.

“We have to, that woman shot Henry,” said Jon, “Dirk, the clothed man was Henry Miller.”

Dirk sighed, “Todd was right.”

Bobby re-joined the group, “we can’t just run into the situation, we have to let the police know.”

“No, that woman is one step ahead, she played the police when they were here with Henry,” stated Jon, “I need to take that tape alone, it’s the only way to get Lily back safe.”

“I’m certain if Farah was here, she’d be saying we need a plan. You can’t just go in alone,” said Dirk.

“We’ve no other choice,” said Jon.

Bobby had no input, he had his fingers over his mouth and his eyes closed. Dirk ran his hands down his thighs.

“I’ll see if can reach Todd then,” and he gestured that he was going to step outside; Jon’s eyes were glazed but nodded, and Bobby was distracted.

Dirk stepped outside the building and leant against the wall. Things were not going to plan, yet again. If there even was a plan. And here was Dirk, slap in the middle, trying to manage a mystery he couldn’t wrap his head around. It was like he only had half of the story.

And now someone was in danger and it was up to him and his gang of misfits to save the day!

It was enough to make you cry. He could really do with Todd round about now. Todd could build him up and tell it would be okay; the universe was watching. Nothing bad would happen to him. In the end. A lot of bad would happen in the meantime but in the end it would work out for the best. There’d be a satisfying conclusion, they’d beat the bad guys, and they could go home.

But right now, Bobby’s girlfriend was kidnapped and his partner had been killed. And an innocent girl had been murdered.

He tried to reach Todd’s phone but it went to voicemail.

“Hey Todd! Hey, how’s it going with that Lewis guy? I’m sure you’ll be fine, you always are,” Dirk began talking to the voicemail, “so we’ve got a situation, Lily has been kidnapped and is being held hostage by some woman. We have to give her the tape to get Lily back, so I need you to get back here.

“And I could do with you being back here because I know its only been a day but a lot has happened and I could do with talking to you about it. We’ve been through this kind of things before and I know I’d feel better if I just talked it out with you. I’m a little stressed. I didn’t expect things to get so out of control.

“It kind of feels like I’ve been several steps behind on this one. Really stumbling around in the dark. It’s like I’m driving in the dark, and people in the back, and I’m the one who can see a little way ahead, but honestly I’m as lost as the guys in the backseat who can’t see a thing. And yet they’re relying on me to drive and keep us safe. Do you know what I mean? Is that a weird analogy?

“I just wish I could turn those headlights off you know? I wish I could be driving in the dark like everyone else. It’d be less pressure that way. And it wouldn’t feel like I’d have to drive everyone, someone else could take the reins, for once. You know, for once. Like I thought Jon being holistic could mean he’d take charge a little, but he’s as lost as me! It’s like these abilities we have aren’t helpful at all, they’re just nuisances. Stupid, silly nuisances.

“Sorry, I think I’m starting to ramble (,” he sniffed, “) anyway when you’re done we’re going to need Farah’s help to come up with a plan, she’s really good at that. Be safe. I need you.”

He hung up. Then rubbed his eyes. He waited for a moment before he went back into the apartment, gearing himself. And when he realised he had nothing really to gear up for he went in.

*

Farah and Todd got out of the cab at the zoo, right at the university building. A police car was stationed outside, but the place looked empty. Even when they got closer they found there was no one stationed inside. Alice’s office was taped off but that was the only mark of a police presence. Perhaps they had taken a break. Or maybe they’d gone home for the day. The rest of the building was quiet as well, likely letting everyone have the day off after a death of their faculty.

Todd tried to brace Farah, “okay stay calm. We don’t know exactly how much Lewis is involved and we really just need information. I don’t know how well we’ll be able to kick his ass if this is a trap.”

“I get it Todd, just lay off,” said Farah.

It was starting to look like Lewis wouldn’t show. There was no sign of life. It was an empty building. The lobby area that lead off to the hallways towards offices and facilities was dimly lit, the light outside was lingering with the sunset on its way, but the oncoming rain clouds meant that it was getting dark fast.

Suddenly, the PSA system crackled and the speakers in the lobby began projecting the sound of Lewis’ voice, “hi guys. Sorry, I’m here, I’m just at the announcements office.”

Todd gripped Farah’s arm to stop her running away. He called out, “we’re here Lewis. Do you want to tell us what happened?”

Lewis hesitated, but then came back, “sorry I had to turn up the security footage audio, I couldn’t really hear you. Say that again?”

“What happened earlier? With Alice?”

“These guys arrived. They said they were looking for the computer. Do you realise what it does?”

“No,” said Todd, “who were the guys?”

“I,” and Lewis hesitated, “do you not know?”

“No, how would we- where’s the computer?”

“It’s safe for now. I locked it up,” said Lewis, “do you know about the guy who owned it?”

“Henry Miller?”

“Maybe, I don’t know his name,” said Lewis, “do you know what he was doing?”

Todd tongued his cheek, “not really, he was working with Ava is all we know.”

“Who’s Ava?”

“You don’t know who Ava is?”

Lewis sighed, “okay, do you know if there are any more computers?”

“There are more computers?”

“I don’t know, I’m asking you. I don’t know anything, I’m trying to understand if you’re working with the bad guys.”

Farah seethed at this, “we’re not the bad guys,” she managed to spit.

“Who are you then?”

“Detectives.”

“Looking into Henry Miller?”

“Looking into Jon Carlyle, a completely different person,” said Todd.

“Why were you looking at Henry if you were looking into Jon?”

“We don’t know.”

“How do you not know! What you just stumbled onto this computer whilst looking into someone completely different!?”

Todd tilted his head, “yeah pretty much.”

“How do you know Dirk Gently?”

“We work together.”

“What does he know?”

“Maybe more, maybe less. Most likely less. We don’t know anything.”

There was a rustling sound and it took a little longer for Lewis to come back onto the airwaves, “so you don’t know anything about the computers.”

“Look Lewis, if you took the computer, that’s fine!” said Todd, turning around in the spot looking for the security camera, “we just don’t want anyone else hurt.”

“Yeah me neither,” said Lewis, “it sucks. I didn’t want Alice to die.”

Farah couldn’t hold her tongue anymore, “and yet you killed her?”

“I didn’t kill her!” said Lewis, “it wasn’t me!”

“So you just happened to waltz out with the computer, scot-free?” Todd tried to quieten Farah and calm her down, but she shirked his grip, “how about you show your face you coward!”

“I really can’t.”

“Just who are you guys!? You think you can just kill people and get away with it! We saw that woman murder Missy, we’re not going to let you get away with this!” shouted Farah.

Todd realised that Farah had said exactly the wrong thing, and there was a moment of silence.

“Sorry I didn’t catch that,” said Lewis, “you said Alice right? And the only person you saw murdered was Alice?”

“No you jackass-“

“Oh sorry you’re cutting out I-“ and then there was the sound of more rustling, and a couple bangs, “yep sounds like you guys don’t know anything, you should-“ more rustling, “you should go! I’ll meet up with you, with the computer la-“

There was another bang, and then another voice, deeper, spoke on the PSA, “who is this Missy?”

“The officer your woman killed in Billboard! That’s right, we saw it! We saw all of it!” shouted Farah, “and I’m coming for you. I’m coming for all of you!”

“Was she blonde?” asked the voice.

Farah stopped herself, realising she was blundering right into something that she didn’t understand, and she didn’t want to just say everything, “uh maybe. Maybe she might have been brunette.”

There was radio silence. They waited for Lewis or the other person’s voice to return but nothing. Farah looked at Todd, her eyes red but her look was fierce. Todd realised she was on a war path. Until she said, “did I say too much?”

Todd gulped, “I don’t know what too much is. What do we do?”

“Stay right there!” shouted the PSA. Except it wasn’t the PSA.

It was a compressed audio channel, but it came from a hulking figure waltzing down the hallway. Farah took a look at Todd and then back at the figure. They were huge, bigger than a normal person, but in the dim light they couldn’t make them out.

“Stay back,” said Farah, “I will fight you.”

“Try it,” said the hulking figure.

And they shifted, as if falling over. But instead they landed on their hands and began to sprint on their arms and legs like an animal. In the moment it looked scary. Never had Todd and Farah seen someone run like that. But then it looked normal. It was if it wasn’t a human running at them at all. Like it was some kind of animal.

And when the figure ran under a light, and it lit up just exactly what they were facing, they saw it was no human at all. The hulking figure was a bear. A brown bear. And its jaws were open bearing its teeth, large, glinting and silver. As if it was a bear in a gang. A gang bear. A gang bear?

This was the thought that popped into Todd’s mind before he and Farah made a move to get out of the way as the bear bounded into the lobby and slid on the tile floor, turning to keep them in its sights. Then it lifted itself back on its hind legs.

“You know too much,” said the bear in the same compressed voice, deep and filled with static, its jaw not moving as it spoke. Its face was one face, no facial expression, just a plain bear’s face, but when it opened its jaw its eyes squinted and its brow furrowed and its teeth were bare for them to see.

“What are you!?” shouted Farah in disbelief.

But the bear took a swing for them. Both Farah and Todd fell to the floor in shock and scrabbled up and away from the bear. They immediately ran for a swing door that was in front of them and ploughed into it, before wrenching themselves back and throwing themselves against it to hold it shut.

The bear only followed and charged the door. The force almost threw them off it, but they realised it would get through and stepped back and away. The bear charged again, smacking the door against the wall, shattering the glass inside its viewport. A compressed laugh emitted from the bear.

Todd grabbed Farah’s arm and dragged her into the nearest room, an office, and slammed the door shut. He tried to lock the door but panicked and fumbled. It took him a couple tries to get it, just before the bear launched itself at the door, its face pressed up against the glass.

Farah caught her breath against the desk in the room. “What the hell is going on! Am I right in thinking that’s a bear!?”

“It’s a bear and it’s trying to kill us,” said Todd, “you were right, it was a trap.”

“And we’re literally trapped,” Farah grunted in frustration, “I NEED a gun!”

“Okay let’s focus on getting out of here!” said Todd, “we got to get back to the lobby. When I say when, run for it.”

“When?”

“Right,” said Todd and braced up against the door watching the bear.

He saw it gear up as much as it could in the corridor. It shook its head ready to charge. Just as he saw it lift its front paws up to go into the door with all its weight, Todd unlocked the door, pulled it open, and swung round with it.

“When!” he shouted.

The bear realising it was still going full throttle launched into the desk, smashing it in half and tumbling into the office. He rolled back onto his front, but Todd and Farah had already slipped round the door and shut it. The bear returned to its hind legs just as Todd and Farah began running back toward the lobby. A hallway veered to the left.

“That won’t hold him!” shouted Farah.

“It’ll hold him long enough!” shouted Todd, and they heard a bang from the office. Todd lifted his hands, “no opposable thumbs!”

The bear cursed from inside the office. His bear paws struggled with the door handle but he couldn’t grip it as he slammed it down. He resorted to bashing the door down instead.

Todd and Farah were almost at the lobby, but their way was blocked yet again. A new figure appeared, bottom heavy, with large ears, and a tai- it was a kangaroo. They were being blockaded by the zoo’s animals. The zoo had revolted and they were in the midst of the animal uprising.

“It’s the animal uprising!” shouted Farah.

They stopped running and tried running back the way they came. But then the door to the office smashed open and the bear looked their way, “got you!”

They tumbled into the hallway to their right. There was just wall and windows on their left and more doors on the right. Farah instantly tried the first door she could and they thrust the door closed. They were in an amphitheatre now, one that must’ve been for lectures. But they were at the stage, and the other exits were up the two flights of stairs that ran through the rows of seats.

Todd and Farah careened to the nearest staircase leading up. Todd felt like his sides were on fire, a stitch roaring up it.

“I’m no good at cardio,” he said.

The door burst open and Farah grabbed him to shove down onto the floor between rows. She pressed a finger to her lips and they lay there, still. The kangaroo and the bear were now in the amphitheatre.

“Come on out, we know you’re in here!” shouted the deeper voice from before, “Wung, you take the right, I’ll go up the left.”

They were sitting ducks now. But at least they had the element of surprise. They remained laying down as flat as they could, listening to the heavy thuds of the animals climbing the stairs, looking for them.

Suddenly, the chairs next to them clanged and crashed, and Todd peered behind Farah to see the kangaroo, stood on the seats, eyes up at the back of the room. It hadn’t seen them yet. Until it looked down of course. Farah managed to slowly turn her head and get a look. She voicelessly panted. But the anger was surging inside her. She threw herself onto her feet, causing the kangaroo to look down, and she threw all her weight into her fist to connect with the kangaroo’s snout.

It clanged and Farah yelled out in pain, knowing she’d broken her wrist. The kangaroo hadn’t moved, but its head had clicked and was off angle. It clicked its head back into place.

“What is that, metal!?” shouted Farah.

The kangaroo lifted a foot and kicked at Farah, hitting her in the chest and sending her up into the air and up a couple rows of seats. The kangaroo stepped on to the next set of seats and readied its stance to jump.

“No!” yelled Todd, also now jumping up and grabbing the kangaroo’s tail.

Not expecting the interruption, the kangaroo’s leap was off kilter and it ended up slamming down into a row in front of Farah on its side, sending Todd off his feet and further down his row on his back. Where the bear was waiting. It raised a paw and slashed, but Todd rolled and pulled himself out of the way just in time. He raced down the row, the bear having trouble as these were not accommodating of bears. It growled in distaste and yelled; “get over here!”

The kangaroo got to its feet as Todd passed it and reached Farah’s row, who was just coming back to reality after being winded. He helped lift her up and they managed to get into the aisle as the kangaroo smashed a couple of seats in the row next to them, its feet crumpling the woodwork and fabric.

They were at the top of the amphitheatre and at the door as the kangaroo landed another kick at Todd’s back, sending them through the door and spinning onto the tiled floor. But now they had another door blocking the animals.

Todd pulled himself up but the kangaroo had definitely done something, he was shaking and his back had a shooting pain all the way up his spine. Farah attempted to help Todd to his feet and they struggled to traverse a new hallway. This one was on a higher level, but they found a stairwell and ducked into it. Farah and Todd almost fell down the stairs in their current state, but they had to keep moving. The animals would kill them. They were bigger and stronger. No opposable thumbs, but a heck of a kick, and deadly claws.

“Where are we now?” said Farah aloud.

“We go down, head down,” said Todd.

They emerged in another hallway. Suddenly, the speakers crackled into life again.

“Guys! Ms Black! Farah, can you hear me?”

“Fuck off Lewis!”

“Trust me, I can help you!”

“Trust you? After this!?” shouted Farah.

“I never wanted Alice to die, honest! I never wanted any of this! I just wanted to fix VCRs!” said Lewis.

“Fuck off Lewis,” stated Farah again.

Except then the sound of bangs echoed from the stairwell.

“I can help you, trust me! Go back the way you came and go through the door labelled MRI!”

“Is that the way out?” Todd tried shouting, but it ended in a cough that he felt was like coughing his soul out.

“Just trust me!” said Lewis through the speakers.

Todd looked up at Farah, who shook her head, “no way, we’re getting out of here.” Except when she looked up, the kangaroo had bounded into view. She cursed. “Okay Todd, I need you to run for a little bit.”

“I can’t,” breathed Todd.

“You need to!” she turned them around on their feet and headed back the way they came. The bangs from the stairwell they saw was the bear attempting to walk down stairs, which turned out to be impossible for the creature. It had fallen and was getting back on its feet.

Farah pushed on Todd, and Todd tried to kick his legs back into gear.

“That’s it, it’s on your right!” called Lewis from the speakers.

“Shut up Lewis!” shouted the kangaroo in a gravelly and wheezy voice, compressed just like the bear’s.

Farah found the room that Lewis had mentioned and she shoved the door open.

“In the smaller room off the side!” Lewis called.

Farah saw the room they were in was a dead end, “we’re cornered!” she shouted. All she saw was the smaller room and the MRI machine, a huge hole in the wall, big enough to fit an animal.

“Just do it!” said Lewis.

Farah launched to the smaller room. Todd hung back.

“Go, I’ll hold them off,” he said.

“Are you nuts!?” shouted Farah, “if anyone would hold them back its me, but even I’m not in fighting shape.”

She made it into the booth set off the side of the room. A computer sat at a desk. When Farah looked around all she saw was papers and pictures of giraffes, including one mentioning ‘migrating rituals’ which she tossed away.

“The UI is actually pretty easy, log in!” shouted Lewis.

“With what!?”

“I don’t know!”

Farah looked at the screen and found it had been locked by Alice O’Connor, the girl. Todd was still out in the bigger room, on the ground, having fallen over as soon as he’d reached the room. He struggled into a sitting position, his legs splayed out. They felt like they weren’t really there, like they were numb. He punched one to make sure.

And then it started. It was like there were nails in his legs. A thousand nails. And now he could see them too. He screamed in pain. Farah heard him and looked up from the desk, out the protected glass that looked into the rest of the room.

The door banged. The bear and the kangaroo had found them. The kangaroo kicked at the door.

“You need to log in!” Lewis came in the speakers.

“I need to save Todd!”

“You can save Todd by logging in LOG IN PLEASE.”

Farah squealed and typed in some random letters. The login was rejected.

“I don’t know the password!”

“Guess it!”

Farah thumped her head and looked around her. The reports were all of Alice’s research. Then she found the post-it notes stuck around the monitor. One was Alice’s username and-

Oh boy, if the university knew how bad she Alice had been at computer security, they probably would’ve killed her themselves. No that was a terrible thing to think! Farah typed in giraffesarecute48 and the screen unlocked.

The software was already on screen. It was the MRI machine, it had been geared up to scan a giraffe. An x-ray of a giraffe’s pelvis was visible on the monitor. Farah didn’t have time for this.

“Turn it on!” said Lewis.

The door was wrenched open. The bear and kangaroo made it into the room. The bear instantly got to Todd, who was still screaming from the nails that were in his leg. He couldn’t handle all this at once. The bear grabbed him by the leg, claws piercing his skin, and when it dragged him along the ground it was excruciating.

The kangaroo launched a kick at the window to the booth that Farah was in. The glass shattered and fell about the room. Farah yelled out.

“Fuck off dammit!” she shouted.

She whipped the mouse to the start button that was handily labelled ‘start’. The MRI began to hum.

The kangaroo pulled itself up into the smashed window. The bear lifted a paw into the air, aimed at Todd’s head. The MRI flashed.

And the animals suddenly stopped.

The kangaroo fell, its head thumping into the desk with a clang, and the rest of its body falling into the room and onto the floor. It lay motionless.

The bear fell forward, crushing Todd’s legs underneath it, its claws still embedded into him. It too lay motionless.

Todd began hyper-ventilating. It felt like he was about to pass out, he was sure of it.

Farah regained her composure before rushing past the kangaroo, out into the room next to Todd, and grabbed him, “Todd! Todd, you’re okay! I’ve got you!”

She pulled the bear out the way, revealing the blood-soaked trousers. Todd gasped.

“I need to stop the bleeding, hang on,” she said, pulling off her shirt and using it to wrap around his leg. She wound it tightly and then tied it up.

Todd gripped it, grunting and moaning.

“Oh god it hurts,” said Todd, his Pararibulitis attack overwhelmed by the actual pain he had felt.

“I’m sorry Todd, I’m sorry,” said Farah, grabbing his head and pressing it against her chest, rocking him as tears brimmed in her eyes, “but its okay. We’re okay.”

They rocked like that together for a few minutes, recuperating from the horror that had befallen them. The animals were still. The MRI hummed as it continued trying to scan a giraffe that wasn’t there. They remained silent.

Then the speakers crackled.

“That was close,” said Lewis, “wow you guys made it. I can’t believe it, wow. This is, this nuts,” he paused, “I’m sorry, you guys were having a moment. I see it. You don’t need to give me that look. I understand. I’m going to come down. But not right away. That MRI will probably kill me too. We should meet in the lobby. No? No, okay I’ll wait. You take a breather. Damn that was exciting. My heart is beating so fast! If I still had a heart. Right, sorry, I’m talking too much. I’ll stop.”


	10. VCR Repair

_Jon gulped. He wasn’t sure what he was going to see. He wasn’t sure what he was going to say. He trembled and rubbed his left arm awkwardly. The engineer, who’d let him in, finished setting up the screen set-up, sitting on a trolley, keyboard and mouse in front. A speaker was set-up beneath the screen, and above the monitor was a microphone pointed out toward him. The engineer, finished and letting the monitor turn on, then stood up and picked his nose._

_“Yeah so it’ll hear you and it can speak to you. I’m not sure how this is going to work. Helga thought it’d be a good idea so,” and the guy shrugged._

_Jon nodded, “so I can just talk to it?”_

_“Oh yeah. It can be disconcerting. Remember it’s a computer,” said the engineer._

_“Alright,” and Jon noticed the engineer wasn’t getting up to leave, “you’re leaving me alone?”_

_“Helga thought you’d need some privacy,” said the engineer._

_The engineer left the room._

_Jon sighed. He wasn’t ready for this. He hadn’t been ready for the call. It had been a strange barrage of information. He looked around, waiting for when he could talk. The data centre wasn’t large, and this room contained a fair few racks of machines. The hum of them working was loud, but not deafening. Just a steady hum of background noise. It was calming._

_The monitor showed a little text and a flashing cursor. It wanted an input. Jon wondered if he needed to put in an input._

_“Hello?” a voice spoke through the speaker. A voice Jon recognised. “Hello, I see someone’s given me a speaker, did someone want to talk to me?”_

_Jon gulped and found his throat dry. He couldn’t utter a word. This was harder than he thought it would be._

_“Hello?” the voice from the speaker uttered again, soft and calm._

_“Hi,” said Jon._

_The speaker didn’t respond immediately, “Jon?”_

_“It’s been a while,” said Jon._

*

Farah followed Bobby up the stairs into the apartment. She tried to regulate her breathing but it was difficult. This whole situation was going to be difficult. And when she entered the apartment, Bobby was morose and silent, and Jon was sat on the sofa, his hands hanging between his knees. She felt like she’d walked into a funeral. It kind of was.

She folded her jacket that was sodden and wet and put it down on a chair. “Could I get a towel?” she asked.

Dirk, hearing her voice, returned into the lounge from the hallway, possibly from pacing but using Henry’s walking stick to prop himself up. He outstretched his arms and embraced her into a hug, “Farah! I was so worried, my god! You won’t believe what a day I’ve had.”

“Or mine,” said Farah, and returned the hug. It felt nice. She needed nice.

Dirk let her go and noticed she wasn’t alone. Beside her stood a Labrador, who shook its fur to dry itself off.

“Who’s this guy? You got a dog?”

“Hi, I’m Lewis, I remember you from the coffee shop,” said the dog, voice compressed, “and this is actually that coffee shop right? Weird.”

Dirk pointed at the dog, “you got a talking a dog.”

“I got a talking robot dog,” said Farah.

Dirk looked at the dog and tilted his head. Lewis opened his mouth to reveal the metal inside, including the black speaker foam of which his voice came from. “It’s been a very long day.”

Dirk shook himself back into reality, “where’s Todd? I need the tape.”

Farah bit her lip, “Todd is in the hospital.”

Jon lifted up to his feet, engaged in the conversation. Dirk had his hands out in a gesture of surprise, his eyes wide, “why is Todd in hospital?”

“He got hurt, pretty bad,” said Farah, her voice cracking a little, “we got attacked by robot animals.”

Dirk nodded, “is he going to be alright?”

Farah pressed her lips together, “I think so? They hurt his back badly,” explained Farah.

“Where’s the tape?” asked Jon.

Bobby also wanted to hear the answer. Farah closed her eyes, readying herself. Then she pulled out what remained of the VHS tape. A cracked case and a loop of ribbon that had come loose.

Dirk considered it and then looked to Jon for his reaction. Jon looked at it. He took it off Farah’s hands and sat down with it, his eyes never leaving it.

“He got beaten up badly with it on him,” said Farah, “had we known we needed it to save Lily we would-“

“This can’t be happening,” moaned Bobby, “this was the only way they’d give her back! What do we do now!?” He began to hyperventilate, “I can’t do this. I can’t do this!”

“I’m sorry,” said Farah, “we barely got out alive.”

No one had anything to say. The consequences settled in everyone’s minds.

“At least they can’t use it for whatever nefarious scheme they had,” said Farah.

Her words fell on deaf ears. Lewis, who was completely lost, approached Jon. Jon hadn’t his eyes open. His glasses were up on his forehead. Tears were brimming about his eyelids and dripping over his face. His hands were shaking, and he held the broken tape as if presenting it to some imaginary figure.

“It’s alright,” said Lewis.

“No,” muttered Jon, “she’s gone.”

“No really,” said Lewis, “the ribbon is fine. It’s alright. I can fix this.”

Jon looked up, hope forcing its way into his face, “you can?”

“Well, I mean ‘I’ specifically can’t. I don’t have opposable thumbs,” Lewis dropped down onto his four feet, “but I told you guys, I do VCR repair. Sometimes a VHS’s ribbon gets tangled up into a VCR. If you have a blank VHS we can just rewind the tape into it.”

Jon looked up at Dirk and Farah whose faces were also being brought back from the brink of despair.

“Fantastic!” said Dirk, “we can totally find a blank VHS!”

“We have to be quick,” said Bobby, “we’ve got to do the hand-off at nine. We only have a couple of hours.”

“I have blank VHS tapes at the bookshop,” said Jon, standing up, “I’ll get from one over there.”

He pulled on a jacket and without anyone stopping him he ran for the stairs, Lewis following him, bounding as a dog and calling out, “wow I can run so fast as a dog now! This is fun!”

Farah looked at Dirk, “this is going to be tricky. Do we have a plan?”

Dirk fumbled, “I had an idea of a plan but I think you’d be better at this than me.”

“I think we just follow their demands,” said Bobby, stepping up, “we can’t risk Lily’s life.”

“These people are unstable,” said Farah, “they killed Alice and Missy, they tried to kill me and Todd. We need a proper plan.”

“Yeah so I was thinking-“

“Wait,” Bobby held a hand up, “what was that about Missy?”

Farah closed her mouth and looked puzzled at Dirk, “didn’t you tell him?”

Dirk realised just what it sounded like, “okay I hadn’t gotten around to it.”

“When did-“ Bobby tried to begin, “I mean you have got to be wrong. There’s no way,” and Bobby wrestled with the idea in his head.

“She was protecting me and Todd,” said Farah, “I’m sorry, I know she was your partner.”

Bobby’s eyes glazed, “partner? She was a special constable, I’ve only been assigned with her a few times,” his eyes looked up at the ceiling, “I didn’t know her that well but…” He threw a hand up, “I can’t do this. I want to, but this is too much. My dad, Lily, Missy? Is my mum in danger too now?”

He stepped into the kitchen and started opening cupboards. He found the cupboard with the alcohol and glasses and made himself a whiskey. He filled it to the brim and started chugging. Dirk gave Farah a ‘I don’t know what to say look’ to which Farah took over.

“Hey look,” she started, “we have to do something. We need you.”

Bobby spluttered a little from the alcohol content and put the glass down, “are you kidding me? We need the actual police involved now. I’m too involved, I can’t,” and he had to stop himself, his anger was rising. His stress levels were the highest they’d been in years. He could feel his blood vessels expand from the urgent deliveries of oxygen that his body was desperately wasting on panic.

“They’ll be ready for the police. We need to do this ourselves. And we need to stop them, stop all of this,” said Farah, “you’re a police officer. Stay calm.”

“Calm!? I’ve been calm my entire life!? You think I don’t deserve to get agitated? Everyone in my life has been placed in danger, I was just meant to arrest a car thief!” and he pointed at Dirk aggressively.

“Alleged car thief!” protested Dirk.

“I don’t care! You’ve got me in too deep and I let you! But I’m getting out of this now, I’m out,” said Bobby, and he marched past Dirk and Farah for the door, “I’m getting proper police back-up, and we’re going to sort this out once and for all!”

“Stop!” shouted Farah.

“We can talk about this!” said Dirk.

“Nothing you can say can solve this! You even said yourself, you don’t even know what you’re doing half the time! You expect me to believe you can save Lily?”

“And I said the universe has involved you!” said Dirk, “you can’t run away now!”

“I’m running away from that bullshit that the universe is involved in any way! It let Missy die, it let that girl die, it let my dad disappear, it let Lily get kidnapped, how is ANY of this part of some bigger plan! I’m done, I’m taking control again the only way I know how!”

“It won’t work!” Farah shouted, “if you involve the police then Lily is as good as dead! They’ll do just like they did with Missy. With Alice. And you’ll never get her back.”

“Well then fuck it, she’s dead no matter what we do!”

“No,” said Farah, “we WILL get her back.” Farah jabbed a finger into Bobby’s chest, before she grabbed his shirt and threw him up against the wall, “my friend has been hospitalised. I saw Missy murdered before my eyes; murdered protecting me. I don’t care what you’re going through because I will NOT let you jeopardise my only chance to make sure both those things were for a reason! We’re going to get Lily back, we’re going to keep the tape, and I’m going to shoot that woman whose caused all this right in the head between the eyes so she can’t cause any more harm!

“I swear, I will tie you to a chair if I have to, because I HAVE to do this. Or you can take your shit and throw it away for a second while we sort this out. Cry afterwards. Right now we have to fight.”

Bobby had his hands on Farah’s wrists. His eyes searched hers. She glared him down and realising she meant business he quickly nodded. He slowly let go and he slumped down the wall.

“How come I had Dirk and not you,” gasped Bobby.

“Because it was the universe’s way for Dirk to get the answer,” she turned to Dirk, “and you will get the answer. I need the information to kill that bitch.”

“I’m working on it,” said Dirk, “it’s totally in the works.”

“I believe in this stupid crap,” said Farah, “it’s saved my ass twice. You don’t believe it, fine, but you’re in it. You will do what I say.”

Bobby pulled his knees up to his chin.

“Okay,” he stuttered.

Dirk was somewhat scared of Farah right now. He’d never seen her on such war path. She was ferocious, she was determined. Her hair was also still wet.

“God dammit I need a towel!” she yelled and stormed out of the room to look for one.

Dirk approached Bobby slowly, and crouched onto the balls of his feet, “I’m sorry Bobby.”

“No, she’s right,” he mumbled, “you did find out what happened to my dad.” When he looked up he didn’t look like an adult man. He looked like a child who was lost and wanted his parents. “I trust you.”

Dirk nodded and stood up. Christ, he needed to work this out. He seriously needed the story from Farah. She must have the missing half of the story.

When she got back she had a towel wrapped around her head, “Dirk, I have an idea of a plan. But it’ll need some work.”

Dirk sprung to her side, “okay, I was thinking something like a distraction.

“And I was thinking about what Lewis said about a blank tape.”

“A blank tape?”

“I think I’ll need Lewis’ expertise, but I have an idea of a plan. To rescue Lily, keep the tape,” she glanced to the side at Bobby, “and, like I said, kill that bitch.”

*

The data centre was located in its own industrial park, a relatively small one storey building, with an iron fence. A barrier with a booth prevented anyone randomly entering. The road then led around the building. The main entrance had a revolving door that was protected by a card lock. Being late in the evening there was no one manning the main reception area. The barrier had a single security guard who had his headphones on and was nodding off-rhythm. He looked pretty young, with a badly trimmed beard and square glasses.

Jon, Bobby and Dirk approached the data centre from the road, head-on, in Bobby’s police car.

Reaching the barrier, Dirk leant out to talk to the security guard.

“Sup!” said the guard, pulling off one ear.

“Er, we’re here to make a delivery?” suggested Dirk, which was true.

“Yeah go on. Round the back,” said the guard dismissively and he raised the barrier.

They drove into the car park, but Bobby parked up.

“That was way too easy,” said Dirk.

“They must not be that bothered about security,” said Jon, “which is worrying.”

“Maybe he was paid off by Octagon,” suggested Bobby, “anyway let’s go.”

They stepped out the car. Dirk pulled out the walking stick, still trying to walk on a sprained foot.

Dirk felt nervous. This was a life or death situation. What happened here would determine the fate of Lily. It was a lot of pressure. Lucky they had the plan. And if the plan worked, or at least worked up until the point they had to wing it, then this could all be over. Or as over as it could be. He’d be glad.

He was also now struggling with the new information that Jon and Farah updated him with. The company Octagon was who they were facing, Billboard’s predecessor. Or was it partner? And Henry had been the clothed man. And Lewis had been working for Octagon. And Ava was the name of a supercomputer, that they now assumed was here, and this was why Octagon wanted the tape. The tape was for the supercomputer, the AI. But how did a video record of Ava’s death link to a supercomputer?

They also had to be careful, as Octagon now had the same technology as Robert, Henry and Ava had when they made Peter the parrot, meaning they could be facing robot animals with the minds of people, like Lewis. Two pieces of pretty terrible technology. Yet it still felt to Dirk like they were two completely different threads. He was missing a key point that linked them. The tape. What did the third computer actually do? What was actually on the tape?

He also felt like Jon was hiding something else. Something big.

Jon meanwhile was trying not to think about the last time he’d been to this data centre, and had made a run for it. It was funny as he actually didn’t run out of the data centre, he just strolled out. They didn’t notice he had the tape on him. To know he was bringing it back, he felt like it was a failure. But he knew he had no choice, Lily was in there.

And that was what was on Bobby’s mind; Lily was in there. He had to change from his police uniform so that Octagon didn’t get the wrong idea. He felt unprotected. Not that he had access to much weaponry, but a taser might have been welcome, even if it had no effect on Henry. He hoped they wouldn’t have to face any robot animals, seeing what it had done to Farah.

The three of them walked round the building, following the road, and found a metal shutter. It was lifted half up and inside were trolleys and carboard boxes. This was where all deliveries were made. To their left they saw the legs of someone unconscious. At least Dirk liked to think they were unconscious.

From inside building stepped a hulking figure, on his hands and feet. They all gulped at the sight of a gorilla, staring almost blankly at them.

“There’s three of you,” it stated, its jaw opening to bear its teeth, furrow its brow, and reveal the black foam speaker embedded where its throat should be.

Jon stuttered, “there was no stipulation on if I could bring someone.”

The gorilla looked at Dirk and Bobby, “whatever. You got the package?”

Jon nodded overenthusiastically. The gorilla was unphased.

“This way,” it uttered.

The three men followed the gorilla into the data centre.

Meanwhile, at the barrier, the guard was jamming to the Arctic Monkeys when he heard the sound of a bark through his headphones. He prised them off and saw a Labrador trying to get his attention. It was a strange bark, it didn’t sound real. The guard stepped out the booth.

“Hey buddy, what’s up? You lost your owner?”

“Bark!” shouted Lewis, “Woof! Ruff!”

“You’re a funny one,” said the guard, bending down.

To which Farah took advantage and delivered a quick blow to his head with Bobby’s truncheon. The guard fell unconscious to the ground and Lewis whined.

“Sorry Lewis,” said Farah, “he’ll be alright.”

She crouched down and unpinned the security card from the guard’s belt. Then they ran to the main entrance.

*

Back inside, the gorilla lead the three men down a wide corridor. It was non-descript, tiled floors, blank ceilings, and walls covered with security and safety notices about data protection, data security, and rules about fire safety. It was empty apart from them. And in the background they could hear soft hums and whirs of hundreds of servers behind closed doors.

“So,” said Dirk, “you’re a gorilla?”

The gorilla grunted.

“How’s that panning out? I bet you could bench a lot now,” he continued.

The gorilla kept walking, but turned its head slowly toward Dirk, “what are you doing?”

Dirk shrugged awkwardly, “small-talk I guess. Just getting to know you.”

“We don’t need to know each other,” said the gorilla.

“We’re not enemies here,” said Dirk, “look I’m Dirk-“

“I don’t care.”

“What’s your name?”

“It’s not important?”

“It’s nice weather we’re having.”

“We’re here.”

The gorilla grunted as they reached a set of double doors. They pushed through into a smaller corridor with glass panels to the left and right. Two doors were at the end. Through the left glass they could see a room filled with racks of servers, lights blinking, fans whirring, with small spaces between the racks forming corridors. It was like a library, methodical and tightly packed, except instead of shelves full of books, it was racks of computers. There was a small area that was cleared out with a stepladder at the side, a bin, and several cardboard boxes. Jon recognised it. Only now, the blonde woman from before was there messing with the trolley rather than the engineer.

The gorilla opened the left door to let them in. From the new angle, Bobby could see Lily. She was tied up on a swivel chair and seeing Bobby she smiled. There wasn’t a gag on her so Bobby could see exactly her facial expression.

“Lily!” he called out.

Jonquil, realising she had company, peered round and a smile perked up on her face, “oh you’re here! Yeah see I brought the hostage. I like this one, she can’t talk.” Then Jonquil lifted her gun out her holster and pointed it at them, “you can hold it right there though. I don’t want you coming much closer.”

The three men obliged and held their hands up. Bobby was analysing the situation. For the winging it bit, this made it a lot easier. Sure, they had a gorilla, but apart from that it was just this woman. And she had a gun. He could get the gun, and now he knew you could shoot a robot, the gorilla would be dead. This could work out. Plus it was three-to-four on two. Maybe even six on two if Farah got there.

He looked around and noted that the servers also were good coverage, the small corridors they made were perfect to try and lose them in a chase. They could definitely hold out here until the back-up arrived.

“So there’s three of you? Didn’t realise you needed three people to deliver a video tape,” snarked Jonquil.

“This is Dirk, he had the tape,” said Jon.

“And that’s my girlfriend,” stated Bobby.

Jonquil rolled her eyes, “well good for you, you sure made her happy. Look, she was so sad before, and you’ve really helped cheer her up. It’ll be good to just finish this up,” she lowered her gun, “Duke, keep them where they are, I need to finish some wiring.”

Jonquil disappeared behind the trolley. The three men looked back at the gorilla who looked at each of them in turn. Dirk nodded, and then glanced at his watch. It read eight fifty-five.

*

Farah and Lewis were in a small room with a fuse box and heavy set of thick wiring leading up the walls. This was the master electrical suite, the room that Lewis had told Farah about. The main control for power in the building. She could theoretically control power across the whole data centre.

 _“We need to obtain Lily, and to do that we need to give Octagon the tape. But they only need to think they have the tape. We could bluff with a blank tape,”_ she had said when trying to come up with a plan.

_“There’s no way we could bluff, what if they check what’s on it?” said Jon._

_“Then we prevent that,” said Farah._

_“We could shut down power in the datacentre,” suggested Lewis, “the supercomputer won’t be able to turn on that way.”_

_“We just need to coordinate it. If you give them the tape before nine-twelve, then I can shut down power, but not too early in case she tries to test it before the power goes out.”_

_“Why nine-twelve?”_

_“Because Dirk, if the power goes out at nine, exactly when the exchange is meant to happen, that’d be pretty suspicious right?”_

_“Yeah, that sounds right.”_

_“The outage will mean that engineers will be called onsite automatically,” said Lewis, “Octagon will then be faced with escaping before any of them get here, or else get discovered. They’d be forced to give up, and in that situation they may end up releasing Lily because, as far as they know, they have the tape.”_

_“They may not,” said Farah, “but then we distract them. We force their hand. We keep them occupied in the data centre. They’ll be OUR hostages, unless they give us Lily. That’s the main plan.”_

_“We don’t know how many of them there could be,” said Bobby._

_“They wouldn’t be able to fit many of them in that data centre,” said Jon, “I know that place, and if they’re in an enclosed room with the supercomputer then they can’t fit many people in there. Maybe four?”_

_“Then we send you three,” Farah sighed, “Jon what is on that tape? Why did you take it in the first place? You’ve hidden that this whole time, but I don’t understand why?”_

_Jon rubbed the back of his neck, “data. Look, it’s just important data. That’s not that important, let’s focus on getting Lily back.”_

And now here was Farah, watching the clock tick and waiting to shut down the data centre at nine-twelve exactly.

“This is so illegal,” she muttered.

*

“Alright, I think I’m done,” said Jonquil, “shall we do the exchange?” she chugged some water from her water bottle and wiped her forehead.

“First,” said Dirk, lifting a finger, “how about you tell us what’s on the tape?”

Jonquil gestured ignorance, “I don’t know. All I know is it’s what gets Ava to work.”

“What data did Ava get that could make a supercomputer? I don’t understand. They were working with animals,” said Dirk, turning so that he was actually asking everyone.

“Not really what I care about,” said Jonquil.

“Also, who are you?” asked Dirk.

Jonquil was taken aback, “I should be asking you that question! You saunter over here and find Jon after we’d been searching for years!”

“I’m Dirk Gently,” said Dirk, “I’m a holistic detective, which means I-“

“And I’m Count Dracula, or call me Amy Poehler, I don’t care,” said Jonquil, “quit stalling and give me the tape.”

Dirk slowly reached into his jacket and even more slowly, pulled the tape out. Jonquil watched him and grew increasingly frustrated. She cautiously stepped up, gun in her left hand, pointed at him. Dirk then incredibly slowly turned the tape and stretched out to hand the tape to her. Jonquil had to snatch it from him.

“Stop that,” she said.

She then backed up, looking at the tape, “is this it?” she directed the question to Jon, “this looks like a VHS tape?”

“It is a VHS tape.”

Jonquil squinted, “I thought it’d be a computer tape or something,” she said.

“Alright, now give us Lily,” said Bobby, returning the focus to the exchange.

“Hold on,” said Jonquil looking the tape over, “let’s check this is the real one shall we?”

Dirk stole a look at his watch. It read nine-ten.

“Wait!” he said, to which Jonquil gave a resigned look, “that wasn’t the deal. You have the tape, now let Lily go!”

Jonquil looked unimpressed, “oh yeah? And leave me with a fake tape? There’s no way I know this is real. We’re gonna try booting this up.”

“And then what, are you going to just shoot us all?” said Dirk, “we’ve no guarantee you’re not going to just kill us.”

Jonquil sighed, “look I told Jon already, I don’t LIKE killing people. It’s actually very hard to get away with. Plus what, I hide your bodies around the area where my supercomputer is stored? You’re not a threat to me. You guys are just upset I took your tape. And technically, two of you are criminals! In what way could you threaten me?”

“If that’s true then let Lily go!” said Dirk.

“And like I said before, there’s no way I don’t know this is fake, so I’m not about to be ripped off. You try to trick me and I’ll chop off her toe. Wait no,” and she tapped her chin, “I’ll cut her hair? Is that non-threatening enough? I hate the law.”

Jonquil reached the trolley and disappeared into the racks of servers to find the tape slot for the VHS. It looked just like a VCR. She slotted the tape in and then returned to the trolley.

“Okay, let’s get this ball rolling. Let’s bring Ava online!” she said triumphantly.

And then the power went out.

*

Farah swept her hands over every fuse switch she could see. She kicked at the wires just for good measure. The lights went out.

“You didn’t need to shut down everything,” said Lewis.

“Just for good measure, now let’s hope-“ but before she could finish her sentence the lights came back on.

The whirring didn’t even skip a beat, the fans kept beating. She looked over at Lewis.

“Uh oh,” said Lewis.

“What happened?” asked Farah.

“Oh. Oh… Oh no,” said Lewis, “sorry I forgot. My mind has been patchy ever since I became a dog-“

“What happened!?” shouted Farah frustrated.

“We’re in a data centre! They’re built to never have an outage! They probably have a backup generator, or a backup grid or-“

“Lewis are you kidding!? They’re stuck then!” she shook her hands, “shit they’re going to die.”

*

The lights flickered back on and Jonquil gave another unimpressed look at the three guys. But Jon, Dirk and Bobby had very convincing confused faces on. Because they also were confused that the lights had come back.

“What was that?” asked Jonquil.

The gorilla, Duke, thumped his hands behind the men.

“I have no clue,” said Dirk, cursing Farah and wondering what the hell had happened to her.

Jonquil was standing ready and waiting for something else to happen. When the servers continued running she cautiously returned to the trolley. She typed in a command and waited. Then she lifted herself up looking smug.

“No data, what a surprise,” said Jonquil, “alright so, NOW give me the real tape or I will kill one of you.”

“There must be a mistake-“ started Dirk.

“Oh yeah? Maybe I’ll start with you, Mr Gently. You seem to just stumble upon everything, eh? You stumbled on Jon, your friends stumbled onto the second computer – hell I’m surprised you only turned up two days ago! It’s like you’ve had a hand in this from the start!

“How did you know there even was a second computer huh? How did you know Jon had this tape? Two completely separate projects and yet you’re entwined in them both, it’s like you’re the linchpin. Did you develop the supercomputer? Were you with Robert or Henry when they first were building the animals?”

“No!” shouted Dirk, “I literally know nothing!”

“I literally can’t believe that,” mocked Jonquil, “hell you even stumbled on Lewis my undercover agent! You’re like some secret agent aren’t you, trying to steal all this technology,” Jonquil flicked the safety off her gun, “I swear you will give me that tape!”

Dirk lifted his hands, “I really wish I was. Truth is, I’m always at the wrong place at the wrong time, or sometimes the right place at the right time. I’m blind alright? I’m as blind as all of you but it looks as if I know where I’m going.”

“Oh sure,” said Jonquil, “give me the tape.”

Dirk relented and nodded to Jon. Jon sighed and revealed the tape in his own pockets, as a failsafe. He presented the newly rewound tape to Jonquil who again snatched it away.

“I’m so close here! Stop getting in my way!” she shouted.

She kept the gun pointed at them, even when she had to eject the old tape and put the new one in. She tossed the old one to the ground and returned to the trolley. She ran another command, and this time the interface filled with lines and lines of code. She waited silently and so did everyone else. Everyone held their breath.

Jonquil then pumped her fist, “yes! She’s online,” and she gripped the trolley, “look! All this data, oh its fantastic.”

She then adjusted the microphone, “Ava, can you hear me?”

Everyone waited. Dirk was confused and Bobby was too. Jon looked defeated.

Then the speaker beneath the monitor finally crackled, “hello? Who’s that? Jon?”

Dirk snapped his head to look at Jon.

“No my dear, my name is Jonquil,” said Jonquil, “I’ve taken over your operations. Now-“

“Where’s Jon?” asked the computer.

“That’s not important. Run diagnostics,” ordered Jonquil.

“Not until you tell me where Jon is,” said the computer.

Jon stepped up a little so he could be heard, “I’m here Ava.”

“Jon? What happened, did we escape? Who’s this woman?”

“I’m sorry Ava, I failed. I couldn’t free you,” said Jon.

In Dirk’s head the cogs clicked and he suddenly bent at the knees and yelled, “ah! I’ve got it!”

“What the heck, this is still a computer right?” asked Jonquil.

“I know! I know!” said Dirk, and he began quickly ambling up toward the trolley, causing the gorilla to step forward to stand directly behind Bobby, making sure no one else got away from him.

Jonquil raised her gun and pointed it at Dirk’s head, to which Dirk lifted a hand defensively, “wait, sorry, I have a question. Well more several questions,” he said, “well actually-“

“What is this?” asked Jonquil, confused.

“Ava?” called Dirk, “my name is Dirk Gently,” he paused, “how are you?”

The computer waited and responded, “I’m okay. Who are you?”

“I’ll get to that, I have a little story to run by you and seeing as you’re the only person who was there do you mind telling me if I’m correct? And maybe give me some dates, as SOME PEOPLE,” and he glared at Jon, “were very stringent on details.”

“Stop that, don’t ask her anythi-“ Jonquil tried to order, but Dirk interrupted her.

“Please, it’ll make us all feel better. Normally I have a better crowd when I explain the case, but we’ll go with what we’ve got,” said Dirk.

“What are you talking about?” asked Jonquil.

“I’ve solved the case!”

Everyone looked at him with blank eyes.

“You already solved the case,” said Jon, “it was Henry who had broken into my home.”

“Yes I know,” said Dirk, “but I mean the WHOLE case. Or most of it. Some of it. Look, here’s how it goes,” and Dirk geared himself up as he launched into the story.


	11. Definitely Not Small Talk

_More than twenty years ago, Jonathan and Ava Carlyle were a loving married couple when Jon went onto the TV show Mastermind and won it. Twice. Shortly after, he disappeared. Am I correct?_

“Yes,” said the computer, “in 1992.”

_1992! Yes! Ava, you had no idea, but Jon had been kidnapped by Black Wing, an American agency that was dedicated to collecting special individuals, and so had taken Jon as Project Alexandria, the holistic scholar. But you continued working as you had for a company named Octagon, for Helga Whittacker who ran the artificial intelligence department._

_Working on artificial intelligence, you join forces with Henry Miller and Robert Louis; one a zoological neurologist who was studying animal brains, and one a fantastic inventor who built robot animals. As a trio you succeed in transferring the minds of small animals to the robots by use of two computers – one that did the download from the animal brain, and one that did the upload to the robot’s hard drive. One of those successes was Peter the parrot._

_Then you built a third computer. This computer was special because this time it was to move the mind, not directly into a machine, but into writable media! In this case VHS tapes._

“Why VHS tapes by the way? Why not a diskette?” asked Dirk.

“Well VHS was cheaper back in 1995 (‘thank you’ uttered Dirk). And it stored more than a floppy disk. But-“ the computer replied, but Dirk launched back into his story.

 _Anyway, so they built a third computer to transfer a mind into a VHS tape! But either accidentally, or unintentionally, they write Ava’s mind to a VHS._ _Henry is devastated. Robert feels it was inevitable. They dismantle the third computer, and Robert decides to dismantle all his work. Henry is distraught at causing his friend’s death but hands the VHS to Helga. He then attempts to use his own computer to end his life, depressed from guilt._

_But ah, he doesn’t know that Robert hadn’t got the chance to destroy his computer! Because Octagon had taken Robert and all his machines. They attempt to use it, but without the second computer they are stumped. Henry is then transferred to a human automaton that Robert had built. But there’s still an issue, the hard drive isn’t big enough to hold his mind; he loses some of his memories and escapes into the night._

“I assume you killed Robert eventually,” said Dirk to Jonquil.

“I never said that,” said Jonquil defensively.

The computer took the chance to speak, “I actually wasn’t there for that so I can’t-“

_Jon then gets released from Black Wing around the year 2000. At this point, Helga has managed to use Ava’s mind to build a supercomputer, which is ACTUALLY Ava! Ava as a computer! She does good work using her creativity as a human to do advertising and translations, because what else should a supercomputer be used for? At this point Helga splits from Octagon to create the company Billboard._

_But then, Ava gets depressed. She’s still human, and running random computer processes is boring and sad._

“You didn’t tell me Jon, but that report we found at Billboard, that was about Ava wasn’t it?” Dirk pointed at Jon.

Jon nodded, “yeah, it got me mad.”

_Helga knows the best way to get Ava out of her funk is to bring in family. She calls in Jon. Jon has been hiding for years, traumatised by Black Wing, but eventually she finds Jon and contacts him. Jon comes in and tries talking to Ava. But Jon has now found out his wife, who he thought was dead, was in fact alive and now a computer. He resolves to help her and so steals the VHS tape that contains Ava’s mind and runs!_

_Helga’s company is in a nosedive. So, she calls in Octagon, her old pals, who were in the security business now, and asks for help to retrieve the tape. They agree, but Jon is exceptionally good at hiding, choosing to hide in plain sight in Livingston. Coincidentally he hides in Henry Miller’s old bookshop._

_Speaking of Henry, a year ago, Henry no longer wants to be a robot. He wants to go back to being human. He goes back to Helga, and asks to speak with Ava – now the smartest person he knows - but Helga tells him Jon has run off with her tape. Henry is upset._

“And here’s the kicker,” said Dirk, “I don’t think Henry ‘found’ you Jon. I think he went home. I think he was upset at not having found you, he just went back to his roots. He found someone had been squatting in his bookshop. He tried to capture you, not because you were Jon, who he’d been looking for, but because you had taken over his home! But when he tried to follow the police looking for you, that’s when he found out you were you! That’s why he went mad at the police station.”

Jon chewed on this, “but they had been looking for you.”

“Who?”

“The police,” said Jon, “they didn’t get called in for me, they were looking for you. In a way, you caused all of this, Henry would never have found me otherwise.”

Dirk lost his enthusiasm at that point. It was true, he was the reason why anyone had found Jon. If he hadn’t been involved nothing would have happened the way it did.

“I suppose so,” he said, and he took a deep breath, “well Ava? Did I get all that right?”

“Mostly,” said the computer.

“Mostly?”

Bobby chipped in, “well, I want to know how did Henry know Ava was a supercomputer a year ago? If he’d been off the grid.”

“Er well-“

“Also how come Octagon didn’t know there was a second computer if they had taken all of my dad’s machines and research?” asked Bobby.

“Don’t look at me,” said Jonquil, “there weren’t any reports that we found.”

“Then how did you know about Robert’s machines in the first place?”

“Er-“

“Also that doesn’t explain the ivy in my bathroom,” said Jon.

“Yes, well, maybe that was a red herring?” suggested Dirk, “just a little tidbit?”

“Or how Henry knew who Lily was,” said Jon, “why would Henry apologise to Lily?”

“Maybe they’d met while he was a robot and-“

“Wait is Lily there?” the computer asked, directing all attention to the monitor.

Dirk became confused, “wait Ava, how do you know about Lily? You’ve been a supercomputer this whole time, when could you have met Lily? Unless you met Lily before you were a supercomputer.”

“If that was in the 90s, Lily would only have been like three,” said Bobby, “how would Ava or Henry have known a baby?”

Dirk swung on his feet toward Lily. He clasped his hands together and pressed them to his mouth.

“Because Jon was gone. So Ava didn’t have a babysitter,” said Dirk.

Dirk limped toward Lily. Jonquil, at this point, let him. He crouched down in front of the girl, wide-eyed. The nobody. The person who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“Bobby said you went through a traumatic event when you were young, right?” asked Dirk.

Lily was bound but she nodded, looking just as confused as everyone else. Dirk gently patted her knee.

“Ava?” he called.

The computer then explained as best she could, “it was an accident. Me and Henry were confident it would work. I was the test subject. We were an hour into the read and Henry went to go get some food for us. He popped out for McDonald’s for Lily. About ten minutes after he left the scanner started to burn. It wasn’t working, and I was strapped in. I couldn’t move. I told Lily to leave, but she was so small. I don’t know when Henry got back because I had already started screaming and-“ it started to sound like the computer was crying, “I’m so sorry Lily. My darling Lily. You shouldn’t have had to have gone through that.”

Dirk lowered his head and stood up, “when Henry tried to kill himself it wasn’t just guilt of letting his friend die. It was also the guilt of making an orphan of her daughter. And letting her bear witness to her mother’s death.”

Bobby wanted to run to Lily’s side. The girl was confused but her eyes were wet. Even Jonquil wasn’t unphased by the news.

Dirk’s tone changed, “I knew it! I knew there was something else going on! We solved the case like halfway through, there was nothing else to solve, unless you count stopping Jonquil here! But there was a reason for all of this, and it wasn’t to find Henry or stop Jonquil,” Dirk returned to the computer, “we stopped at her coffee shop. We were held in her home! This whole case was to bring Lily back to her parents!”

And then Dirk stepped up to Jon, “Jon the universe was upset Black Wing had ripped you away from your family. And everything that has happened has been to bring you back together.”

“She’s not-“ started Jon, “Ava she’s my daughter?”

“I didn’t get a chance to tell you,” said the computer, “you had disappeared. And then I got the test and-“

Jonquil had to step up now, “alright I can’t believe I’m getting involved now but why the hell would you transfer your consciousness into a VHS tape if you had a daughter? What were you hoping to achieve?”

“I wasn’t,” said the computer, “this was where Dirk got it wrong. You can’t transfer consciousness, that’s impossible.”

“Well I have a story for you…” muttered Dirk.

“Our research was _copying_ data! The idea was never to move it, we wanted to read and write brain waves. The idea was we’d copy my mind to VHS. The original host dying was a side effect - admittedly a BIG side effect – but was never intended. We strived to stop that from happening! Henry knew this, I don’t know why he thought we could reverse the process because he KNEW it was irreversible.”

“Well his memory had been affected…” started Dirk, but then everyone turned to the gorilla, who thumped his fists down and walked past Bobby.

“What,” it stated, gruffly.

“The data write is a data copy, not a transfer. It’s not meant to kill the host,” said the computer again.

Jonquil looked up at the gorilla and she realised she was under scrutiny, “Duke.”

“You said we could go back,” said the gorilla.

“I never said that-“ started Jonquil but she backed up.

“I have a family Jonquil. I have a son!” the gorilla almost shouted.

Jonquil stepped back until she was at the wall of the room, now beside Lily on her swivel chair.

“Look Duke, we can fix this,” she said, trying to stay calm.

“I’m a gorilla forever,” said the gorilla, “a robot gorilla.”

The gorilla stopped in the midst of Dirk and Jon by the computer trolley. It lolled its head in consideration. Then looked at Jonquil.

“I’m done,” said the gorilla, and turned around.

Jonquil turned to the offensive, “you’re done? You’re not done, stand your ground.”

“I should have realised you’d gone mad,” said the gorilla, and went to the door.

Jonquil only watched him. She flexed a hand but she didn’t raise her gun. Her face wasn’t one of anger, it was of defeat. Very, very close defeat. The gorilla pushed the door open, stepped through, and walked on through the corridor, not looking back through the glass as everyone else watched him leave.

When he was out of sight, attention returned to Jonquil.

“It’s over,” said Dirk.

Jonquil shook her head. She shook it softly. Then more violently as a smile crept back on her face, “no, no I’m not done. Okay so the animal robots are out of the picture,” she grabbed the back of Lily’s chair, yanked her close, and pulled out her gun to point at Lily’s head, “but I still have Ava. And now I have Ava’s daughter, who she wouldn’t dare put into danger. Ava will do as I say, you will ALL do as I say! You’re going to leave, else your reunion you think the universe has organised is in for a party-crasher!”

Everyone backed up a little, apart from Dirk.

“Come on, this is absolutely over.”

“It’s not over!” said Jonquil, “you know how much I’ve spent finding Ava and those computers!? God, my heart is beating like crazy right now, you guys are fucking up my regime! Now get out before I kill your daughter! I will KILL her. I don’t care now, I will kill her like I killed that officer, like I killed your dad!” and she gestured to Bobby, “like I killed that zoo girl, like I killed SO MANY people! I have worked too hard to get this! This is my final work! This is the climax of everything!”

Seeing the intent in her eyes, Jon, Bobby and Dirk were scared. It looked like it was lost. They began to leave.

Then Dirk stopped, “no it can’t be the climax. Because I’m still bugged by this,” he raised a finger, “the universe didn’t coordinate all this for you to win! I know it didn’t! It wouldn’t let it,” and he pointed at Jonquil, “you won’t shoot her.”

Jonquil pressed the gun at Lily’s head, “oh you think? I’ve killed a lot of people ‘Dirk Gently’, I’m very capable,” she spat.

“But you won’t,” said Dirk, “and I think I know why. Because I’ve cracked the final piece.”

“There’s more?”

“Only one more piece,” and he turned to look at Jon, “because I don’t get how the ivy in Lily’s basement ended up in your bathroom! There’s that one niggling ‘red herring’,” and he turned back to Jonquil, “there’s never a red herring. It means something.

“Here’s the thing – the ivy grew from Jon’s bathroom sink. It came from the water pipes. Lily said it was fast-growing ivy, so I think it got there because it broke through her basement wall into Livingston’s water supply. It’s been growing in the pipes under town.

“And Lily said she’d used the bark in people’s coffee to make them complacent. What she didn’t realise was that was now true of all water in Livingston,” he whirled back to Jon, “Jon you didn’t let me take the tape because you trusted me. You were complacent. You had been drinking ivy-infused water.”

Dirk turned back to Jonquil, “and not only that, but Jon suffered a sudden attack of sleep earlier today, and actually a few people around Livingston have, haven’t they Bobby?”

Bobby stuttered, “er yeah!”

“Now why would that happen? Maybe it’s coincidence, maybe it was unrelated. But I think it was intentional. Because the universe knew we’d be up against someone crazy, someone who’d be almost unstoppable! But whose weakness was her fitness regime. She drank a lot of water. And if she drank Livingston’s water, she’d get a little complacent,” Dirk began to advance on Jonquil whose eyes were darting around, “but if she drank a LOT of the water, then she’d be victim to the ivy’s second side-effect, just like Jon did, just like those around Livingston, if she drank water like it was the nectar of the GODS! WELL!” Dirk smirked, “I think she’d start to feel just a little-“

Jonquil yawned.

“Sleepy.”

Jonquil tried to glare at Dirk. But her eyelids were heavy. She couldn’t fight it. She yawned.

“No, I…” she moaned, “no…” and she slumped down the chair, the gun falling to the floor and out of her hand. Jonquil collapsed to the floor, completely unconscious.

Bobby immediately was elated, “OH MY GOD!”

He ran to Lily and unbound her from the chair. Dirk bent down and picked up the gun. As he did, the doors in the corridor outside the room burst open and Farah pressed her hands up against the glass. Seeing everyone was in there, she careened into the door, “I’ve been looking everywhere, is everything-“

“It’s all sorted,” said Dirk, “do you want a gun?”

Farah approached him and took the gun from Dirk, “is she-“

“Dead? No, she’s just asleep.”

Bobby hugged Lily and littered her face with kisses, “I’m so glad your safe, I’m so so glad.”

Lily silently cried and laughed at the same time. Even though Bobby couldn’t see her hands, she signed, “(I was so scared.)”

“I wish I had a camera,” said the computer, “I can’t see what’s happening.”

Jon stepped up to the trolley, “it’s all over Ava. Lily’s safe. You’re safe.”

Bobby let go of Lily and bent down to Jonquil. He didn’t have any handcuffs but, luckily being a data centre, he got some zip ties from the wall and wrapped them around Jonquil’s hands, “Jonquil… Jonquil something, you’re under arrest for murder. You’re asleep so this isn’t entirely legal but still.”

He lifted her up in his arms so they could move her, but when he stood up he found Farah pointing Jonquil’s gun at him.

“Put her down Bobby, I’m going to kill her.”

“Farah! No, don’t you dare!” shouted Dirk.

“I have to Dirk, she’s a monster,” said Farah, fighting her tears.

“She’s going to be arrested,” said Dirk, “we’ve won now.”

“She killed Missy!” seethed Farah, “and Alice.”

“And she won’t kill anyone else,” said Dirk.

Lily approached Farah. She didn’t hesitate. Lily wrapped her arms around Farah and squeezed her into a hug, tucking her head onto her shoulder. Farah didn’t drop her hands, until she heard a very faint whisper, “it’s okay.” At that she burst out crying and dropped her hands.

*

Everyone was outside now. Jon was left alone in the room. He was stood at the trolley, at the monitor, “I’ll get you out properly this time.”

“Thank you, Jon,” said Ava.

“I’m sorry it took me so long,” Jon said.

“It gave me time to think,” said Ava, “and I think that I don’t really have much of a future now.”

Jon frowned, “what do you mean?”

“Jon, what’s next? You hide me in a closet somewhere forever? Or you build me a new computer? And then I just watch you and Lily grow old while I just sit in a machine, never changing?”

“But we missed out on so much.”

“You have Lily now. You can live a life with her instead,” said Ava.

“Without you?”

“You already are living without me. I’m not even really me, I’m just a copy! A representation of a mind in digits and code. Just what kind of life would we live?”

“I’ll build you a human body,” said Jon, “like Henry.”

“Didn’t Henry go mad?”

“A little.”

Ava laughed, “it’s okay. I’d like to rest. I died April 14th 1995\. And people have had me working when I’m meant to have been in retirement.”

Jon sniffed, “I don’t want to let you go.”

“You don’t have to, you’ll have your memories. In that silly old way, I will always be with you.”

Jon laughed, “that is corny as hell.”

“Yeah, but right now I don’t want to be a VHS tape that you rewind and watch over and over again to preserve a memory. Move on.”

Jon nodded. “Okay,” he said.

“I love you Jon.”

“I love you too Ava.”

He shutdown the monitor. Then he found the tape deck and ejected Ava’s tape. He held it in his hands. He would do right by her. He would make up for disappearing.

He would snap the tape.

But not right now. He’d leave it a little while. He wasn’t ready just yet. He slipped the tape into his jacket and ran to join the others.

*

Todd sat up in the hospital bed so he could reach out and grab his pills. After swallowing them, a nurse led his two favourite people into the room.

“Hey,” said Farah, holding onto three balloons, “I got you balloons. I don’t know why. All the primary colours though!”

“Cool, thanks,” he said.

Dirk rounded the bed and hugged Todd, patting his back and causing Todd to yelp, “ow.”

“Sorry,” said Dirk.

“So how did it end?” asked Todd excitedly.

“Well Bobby and Lily went home. They’ve also let Jon stay so that he can make up for lost time with his daughter. Lewis I think also decided to enjoy their company, as Lily has always wanted a dog, and Lewis would rather be around people who could accept a talking dog in their lives. The gorilla is still at large,” explained Dirk.

“Gorilla? There was a gorilla?” asked Todd.

“Yeah but he was actually a minor role,” said Farah.

“Did you kill her then?” asked Todd solemnly, directed to Farah.

Farah smiled and shook her head, “no I think I got carried away. I think guns are a bad influence on me, I should stay away from them for a bit.”

“Giving up on guns eh?” said Dirk, surprised.

“What? No! No, no, as soon as we’re back in the US I’m probably going to buy a couple more just to be sure,” said Farah, “but I could do with the break.”

“Oh we still have the hotel rooms for a while, so we actually can take a little break. Whose up for some Scottish culture?” asked Dirk.

“Edinburgh zoo?” suggested Todd.

To which Farah and Dirk laughed, but it soon turned to an awkward cough, “no I was thinking the Scottish national gallery, or a proper Scottish pub! Or maybe ride a train.”

“Sounds good Dirk,” said Todd, “now, I actually missed out on you solving the case. So, could you break it down for me?”

“Yeah actually I missed that too,” said Farah.

“Well!” said Dirk, gearing himself up once again, “this was the case of Jonathan Carlyle! And I swear, if I’ve learnt anything from this adventure,” and he sighed as he tried to think of a good moral…

“it’s that small-talk is the most useless skill I could ever think of.”

THE END...

Jonquil was woken by the sound of the police officer knocking on the bars of her cell with a plate. She wrenched her up from the small bed and gave him a glare.

“Up and at them Kowalska, your trial is later today,” said the policeman and unlocked her cell to bring in the food.

“Where are my vitamins? Or supplements?” she asked, “and is this cereal? Where’s my fruit or protein powder?”

“Standard meals,” stated the officer, “what you think we can afford that stuff?”

Jonquil groaned, “you’ve already ruined my sleep regime by not providing me my memory foam pillow, and now you’re disrupting my food intake?”

“Be lucky you’re getting anything at all, you have several cases of murder against you,” said the officer.

“I am not a murderer…” Jonquil said softly.

“Funny you say that after killing people,” said the officer.

“Is my lawyer here yet?”

“Not yet,” said the officer.

“Then get out of my face.”

The officer left the cell and locked her up. Jonquil pushed a hang through her hair, feeling the oil and sweat coating the follicles and she felt disgusted. Her face was already reeling from the sudden yank from her meticulous regimes that she’d been cultivating for years. How old would she age in the next fifteen minutes? Two years? Ten years?

“Do you mind if someone asks you some questions?”

“Not without my lawyer,” spat Jonquil.

“It’s not about you,” and the officer stood up to let the inspector step in.

He was dressed in a trench coat, with a bushy moustache and thick circular glasses. He looked like he had eye bags on his eye bags. He also had a fine fountain pen sitting in his top pocket. When he stepped him, he seemed to give the officer a nod, but it was hard to tell. The man looked like he’d been awake since he was born and the air he gave was like he was floating from one place to another. He sauntered to the cell and leant against the bars.

“Ms Jonquil Kowalska? I’m Inspector Gilks, I’ve been given a case and I wanted to ask if you were involved.”

“Not saying anything,” said Jonquil.

“It’s about a gorilla that’s been sighted around town. The zoo says they’ve not had any escaped animals, yet we found two robotic animals strewn about their university building, supposedly causing damage. Would you know anything about that?”

Jonquil didn’t look at the inspector and laid back on her bed, “doesn’t sound like anything to me.”

“No gorilla?”

“No gorilla.”

“What about the name Dirk Gently, does that ring a bell?”

Jonquil twitched, “never heard of the man in my life. Fuck off.”

The inspector drifted away from the bars to the officer who gave him a look of ‘nothing else to be done’.

“I told Louis, I told him,” said the inspector, “if he’s still around I want him bound in chains. Or maybe ropes. No wait, I want him locked in a closet and the key swallowed. A closet in Edinburgh castle. Guarded. Seven guards, not six, not eight, seven.”

“Sir you don’t have that kind of authority,” said the officer.

“I’m musing,” said Gilks, “I thought when he’d gone to the US I wouldn’t need to worry anymore. But I still hear those screams of ‘look out! Runaway printer!’” Gilks shivered, “now I’m on the hunt for a gorilla.”

Gilks drifted out of the prison cells and out into the main office. The TV was on reporting on a sighting of the gorilla and Gilks tensed. The officer at the main desk was tilted back in his seat and seeing the inspector righted himself so he could get called on for slacking.

“You, what’s your name?”

“Patel sir,” said the officer, “need a coffee?”

“You don’t look busy. Want to help me?”

“I’m on desk duty indefinitely and-“

“Yeah I don’t care. I need a really big net.”

“…A net?”

“A net, bananas, a book on sign language, some pictures of Jane Goodall,” he took a pen out to write it all down, “and get me a Frappuccino. I can’t stand the bitterness of coffee.”

Patel sighed and slowly got up out his chair, “are you expert at catching gorillas?”

“I really wish I wasn’t, yet here we are.”


End file.
